Our Life, You and I
by MotorcycleChickenSmile
Summary: The Judge is dead. The Beadle is dead. And everyone thought Benjamin Barker was dead. My first fic. Takes place as if Lucy Barker really did succeed in killing herself with arsenic. Sweenett. Rated for language and violence.
1. Chapter 1

_Chapter 1_

_God in Heaven, DIE!_

or

_Toby Is Hit With A Rolling Pin_

"…_sleep now…the untroubled sleep of the angels…"_

_Creak._

Sweeney Todd's nerves jumped to alert at the small sound, his hard eyes lifting from the dripping silver razor and turning over his shoulder to the chest lying against the wall. Calmly, sternly, he took up his thin silver friend from the seat of the barber chair and stood. Small drops of blood dripped and pattered softly on the floor. Judge Turpin's blood was drying and hardening on him by the second, stiffening his face and his fingers. He crossed the room and flung open the chest. He felt no change within him…no quickening of his heart, no sharpness of his breath, nothing…when his eyes fell on the terrified looking youth huddled inside it. Sweeney smiled.

"Come for a shave, have you lad?"

Before the boy could answer, Sweeney seized him by the neck of his clothes and dragged him, stumbling, across the floor, throwing him into the chair. The boy instantly drew his knees up and gripped the armrests, his head sinking fearfully into his shoulders. His mouth was shut, but his eyes were wide and alert and shaking with fear. Sweeney regarded him silently, for a moment. There was something missing, something he should have felt but didn't. It was the thrill; the exhilarated rush he was supposed to have whenever a victim looked up helplessly from his chair. He searched for the relish, the ecstasy, but found nothing. His face was still and blank as he leaned forward, lifting the blood-covered razor to the boy's face. The lad opened his mouth to speak, but Sweeney interrupted.

"Nonsense," he whispered, his mouth again slipping into a coy smile. "Everybody needs a good shave."

The boy's eyes shone with terror. Sweeney lifted the razor high in the air, preparing to slice another throat in the wide world of throats waiting to be slit….and stopped. He froze as a piercing scream rent the air from somewhere far below. It echoed like a distant siren, frenzied and hysterical. It seared in his mind, a burning recognition…

_Mrs. Lovett._

He again regarded the boy. The fair-skinned lad's eyes had fixed on the dripping razor poised high above him. Sweeney looked at it, then the boy, then it, then down at the floor. His face hardened, his teeth clenched, and he lowered his silver friend. He rose to leave, but not before leaning in and putting his white, blood-covered faced inches from the boy, who recoiled in petrified stillness. Sweeney muttered gruffly beneath his breath, and the boy trembled with every word.

"Forget my face."

And he stormed from the room, leaving the youth curled in the barber chair. The boy would run away, of course. It didn't matter. He had seen it in the lad's terrified eyes; he would never speak of what had happened to anyone. He would never pose any kind of threat. Not to Sweeney Todd.

"DIE! God in heaven, _DIE!"_

Nellie Lovett screamed and pulled furiously at her long skirt, fighting to rip it free of the clenching fingers of Judge Turpin. The judge gasped and sputtered, making low gurgling noises in his opened throat. Blood spurted and dribbled from the cut and from his open mouth. Nellie screamed and pulled again, but the judge had a death grip on her hem; she tripped and fell backwards onto the hard, dirty floor of the bake house, the blazing golden light from the oven casting their long, tossing shadows on the cobblestones. The judge murmured and garbled, his dying eyes pleading and pitiful. Nellie cried out and kicked her feet, but achieved nothing other than to tangle herself up in the loose folds of fabric. The judge grabbed hold of her ankle with his sticky hand, and she screamed in terror and disgust.

Suddenly the heavy iron door to the bake house was thrown open, slamming against the wall with a deafening bang. Nellie looked and saw the tall, lean body of Mr. Todd filling the doorway, his wild hair sprayed out even further than usual and his dark, staring eyes narrowed beneath his furrowed brow. His right sleeve was red from shoulder to wrist, and he was covered in dried sprays of blood. In the half-light of the fire he glowed like a red demon.

Todd swooped down on the judge without so much as pausing. Nellie caught a glimpse of his pale, red-spattered face as he dropped to his knees beside them, and she felt an uncommon twinge of fear at the murderous glare in his eye. In the past weeks, she had seen him commit horror upon horror--horrors she herself was his accomplice in--she had seen him walk into her pie shop, his arms and his hands running with blood--she had seen the demonic gleam, the ceaseless hungering for vengeance in his eyes--and never before had she been truly afraid of him. But at that moment, as his razor gleamed in blind fury, she was afraid. She cried out and squeezed her eyes shut.

Nellie heard a sickening sucking noise and a garbled cry. She opened her eyes and felt her stomach turn and her heart pound as she saw Mr. Todd wrenching his razor from Judge Turpin's streaming eye socket. The judge's hands grew stiff and motionless in the hem of her skirt, and with a final gasp he fell still and cold on the floor, dead at last. Nellie lost no time in disentangling herself from his lifeless grasp; she scrambled to her feet and backed away, breathing heavily and staring down at the red scene before her.

Sweeney Todd kneeled beside the bodies of Judge Turpin and Beadle Bamford, his shoulders slack and his gaze fixed dully down at the floor. A long moment of silence passed in the dungeon bake house, with no sound but the constant crackling of the burning wood in the oven. At last, Mr. Todd lifted his head and regarded her.

"Where is the boy?" he asked. His voice was dead and gravelly.

Nellie looked around her at the four walls of the empty bake house.

"He's gone," she panted, her whole body trembling from the shock of the encounter.

Mr. Todd slowly rose to his feet, his gaze trolling around the room.

"Find him," he growled.

Nellie Lovett felt her breath catching in her chest, and, unbidden, her eyes began to blur and fill with tears. She closed her mouth and nodded, turning away. She heard Mr. Todd's footsteps as he slowly made his way around the opposite end of the room. She stifled a gasp with the back of her hand and struggled to slow her pounding heart.

_Oh, leave the boy alone, _she had said.

_Send him up, _Sweeney Todd had snarled.

_No, not Toby. Please, not her Toby…_

A single tear streaked down her face, and she inhaled sharply. Too sharply; she made an audible cry. The silence was palpable as Mr. T's footsteps stopped.

"What?" he demanded in his harsh voice.

Forcing herself into composure, Nellie turned and shook her head. "Nothin', nothin' love. Jus' a bit shook up, bloody judge grabbin' onto me skirts n' all. Never you mind. Go round and look be'ind the wood piles, there…'e…'e may be hiding."

Mr. Todd looked at her with cold, suspicious eyes, but he obeyed. Nellie Lovett stifled another despairing gasp and began walking in slow circles, her wet eyes scanning the room.

"Toby," she called, her voice light and sweet, but wavering with the effort of masking her urge to sob. "Toby! Come out, come out, wherever you are!"

"Toby," Mr. Todd's deep voice called out, sinister in his attempt to sound pleasant.

"T-o-o-by! Where are you, love? Toby?"

"Toby?"

Nellie's throat ached with the catch of her pent up sobs. More tears streamed from her eyes as she passed by a table covered in flour and baking pans; she took up a wooden rolling pin and held it poised at arm's level. She opened her mouth and began to sing softly.

"_Nothing's going to harm you…not while I'm around…"_

"Toby!"

"_Nothing's going to harm you, darling, not while I'm around…"_

Suddenly, there was a sharp clanking sound of metal on metal, and Nellie's eyes shot to the round grate sunk into the floor as the lid was pushed aside and the small, skinny, dark-haired little boy scrambled out.

She opened her mouth without thinking. "Toby!"

The boy immediately ran to her, seizing her by the arm and pulling her toward the door.

"Hurry mum! Hurry! We've got to get out! He's evil, he's a demon, he's…"

Mr. Todd appeared, standing between them and the door. His eyes were dark and his lip curled, staring at Toby with a look that Nellie knew all too well. Toby stood protectively in front of her, his arms to each side as if to shield her, but at the same time he was shaking with fear.

"Stay away!" he shouted fiercely, pushing Nellie back. "It's 'im, mum, I know it's been 'im this whole time! 'E's got you under…under 'is _spell, _mum! 'E's evil, 'e's the devil 'imself!"

Mr. Todd smiled, a smile that even in its murderous throes had always made Nellie want to melt; but now it struck her with a horrible stab of misery.

"Now, Toby," he said quietly, advancing with his razor held at his side. "Why would you say such a thing of your old friend Sweeney? Come, Toby, we're the men of the house, you and I."

"Stay back!" Toby screamed.

"Let's you and me have a nice chat…a heart to heart…like gentlemen. Shall we, son? Darling boy? Let's, Toby, do let's."

"Stay BACK!"

Mr. Todd looked up and caught Nellie's eye. He glared at her and inclined his head, and his gaze went through her like fire and her eyes welled with fresh tears. She could contain it no longer; she gasped and cried softly, shaking, her heart aching and her breath catching. But she had no choice. Before he knew what was happening she had seized Toby in her arms, holding him pinned against her. He yelped in surprise and wriggled and kicked, but his thrashing was in vain. He was trapped, helpless. Mr. Todd grinned as he moved slowly forward. Nellie's chest heaved, her eyes wide as she watched him. He lifted the razor, the thin blade pressed against Toby's throat. The boy grew still and silent, holding his breath as the knife drew closer. Suddenly, she heard his small voice uttering, barely above a whisper…

"Mum…please…"

Mr. Todd's eyes gleamed. Nellie burst.

"NO!"

She pulled him away just as the razor sliced the air. Mr. Todd stared for an instant in shock, then growled furiously.

"Hold him!" he barked.

"No!"

"Hold him I say!"

"NO!"

Nellie sobbed loudly, turning Toby to face her and embracing him, covering his head with her arms. The rolling pin hung stiffly in her hand.

"Please," she cried. "Please, Mr. T….not 'im, not the boy."

"He knows," Sweeney Todd snarled lowly.

"'E won't tell no one, I swear it, Mr. T…"

"He _knows."_

"'E's just a boy, just a little thing, Mr. T., please, can't we…"

"No! He _knows! _He'll go running to the law the moment he's free, and it'll be _your _head as _well_ as mine, Mrs. Lovett!"

Nellie sobbed and buried her mouth in Toby's hair. The boy peered out, wide-eyed and frightened, from the gap between her arms.

"'E won't, Mr. T, 'e won't, I promise! Please let 'im be! 'E's my boy, Mr. Todd, my little Toby."

Mr. Todd suddenly stopped in his advances. The oven crackled. The thick, hot stench of decaying human carcasses that filled the bake house was palpable; it filled the silence in a thick, noxious fume. Nellie and Mr. Todd stared at each other, she with tears in her eyes and he with quizzical blankness in his.

"Your boy," the barber muttered.

Nellie nodded, sniffling. "He is, sir. 'E's like my own."

Mr. Todd turned away. He lifted his silver razor to eye level, turning it and watching his reflection through the congealing lines of blood.

"Your own…"

Suddenly, Nellie gasped in shock as Toby tore from her grasp in one great burst of force. The boy shouted furiously as he leapt at Mr. Todd and took hold of the wrist that grasped the razor in both hands. Sweeney was caught off guard…for an instant his face was wide-eyed and vulnerable with a look of surprise as uncommon to him as the sun to the nighttime…but in a flash he was scowling again, his teeth bared and his dark eyes wild. The boy was scrawny and weak, but he held on for his life as the two struggled for the razor, pushing against each other with all their might. Slowly, Toby began to give way; Mr. Todd was forcing his arms back, the deadly sharp blade inching closer and closer to the boy's throat.

Nellie's heart raced. She cast about wildly, desperately wondering what to do; and she abruptly remembered the weight of the blunt piece of wood in her hand. Just as Mr. Todd was about to drive the razor into Toby's neck, she dashed forward, raised the rolling pin high over her head, and brought it down with all her might…_CRACK!…_over Toby's skull. The boy grew stiff, then his grip slid from Mr. Todd's wrist and his body collapsed limply on the floor.

Nellie and Mr. Todd looked at each other, then down at Toby. He was alive, but unconscious. Nellie lowered slowly to her knees and touched his forehead, cupping his face and ruffling his hair. She sniffled and a tear dripped from her chin as she whispered.

"_Nothing's going to harm you, darling…not while I'm around…"_


	2. Chapter 2

_Chapter 2_

_Untroubled Sleep_

or

_Mrs. Lovett Grows a Conscience_

He was walking. He was fond of walking, on nice days. He liked to look at the clouds, and the grass, and the trees swaying in the breeze. Nature made him feel peaceful, calm.

Lucy was sitting beneath a tree, her peach-colored skirts spread out around her on the blanket, the dappled sunlight casting bright golden spots and dark patches of shadow over her. A faint breeze blew a strand of her yellow hair loose, and she absently tucked it behind her ear as her soft, gentle eyes scanned the pages of her book. She delicately wet her finger and turned the page. Her lips were so bright; rich, rosy pink, like petals.

Tiny Johanna was asleep beside her mother; she was tucked and swaddled tightly in bundles of cotton blankets and lace to keep her from rolling, and her hooded white bonnet kept the sun from her round, pink face. One pudgy arm lay exposed atop her blanket; Lucy lowered the book and gently tucked it in, carefully so as not to wake her. She looked up and caught sight of him standing there; she smiled, lifting her palm and waving.

He smiled back. He had had enough of his walk; he would sit with them, there in the shade, perhaps until teatime, and then they would tuck little Johanna into her perambulator and stroll down the country lane back into the city. He began walking towards them with long, brisk steps, working hard to contain his eagerness. Lucy laughed and raised her hand to him…the sun was in her golden hair...he bent down to kiss her smooth, pale forehead…

And Mrs. Lovett screamed.

Sweeney jerked awake, blinking and staring forward at his own spliced and shattered reflection in the broken mirror across the room. The face he saw was not the bright, honest, laughing face of Benjamin Barker. It was the broken face of a brooding demon, pale and ghostly in the bright moonlight, his eyes turned to dark, lifeless sockets in the harsh shadow. He was slouched far down in the barber chair, a folding picture frame just barely grasped in his hand. He often spent his nights in that chair, but this time sleep had crept up on him. He raised his hand and ran it over his face, groaning.

Mrs. Lovett screamed again, not as loudly as the first time, but more of a weak, despairing wail. Sweeney pushed himself out of the chair, muttering curses under his breath. He grabbed his barbering jacket and pulled it on as he stepped out the door and made his way down the staircase; it was cold outside, winter was setting in fast. They'd be having the first snows of the season any day.

Still grumbling, Sweeney pushed open the backdoor of the pie shop, his feet booming unceremoniously on the wooden floor. He went through Mrs. Lovett's living room without so much as batting an eyelid at the unconscious Toby lying on the chaise. He opened the door, barging into her bedroom without so much as a preemptive knock.

Mrs. Lovett stifled a shriek as he stepped in. She instinctively drew the covers of her bed up over her chest, even though she was fully covered by a nightgown. She had let down her wild red hair and it draped in teased, frizzy ringlets around her shoulders. He wondered fleetingly if she ever even brushed her hair at all. For some deep, uncomfortable reason he couldn't ( or wouldn't ) place, Sweeney rather enjoyed seeing her startled in her nightclothes. He quickly turned away and went and stood facing the small fireplace. Mrs. Lovett's bedroom was tiny, but overstuffed with furnishings; her bed, a matching vanity and armoire, a deep armchair, any number of little boxes and trinkets, and pictures all over the walls and the mantelpiece. But he hadn't come down to pay attention to her tacky taste in décor.

"Mr. T," she gasped, looking crossly at him and lowering the bed cover. "Bless me poor 'art, I nearly thought you was a ghost! One of these days you'll scare me straight to my grave, you will."

"Why did you scream?" he asked, staring into the fire.

He heard a rustle of bedclothes and knew she had turn to sit on the edge of the bed with her bare feet on the floor. He forced himself not to turn and look at her. She exhaled.

"Same reason as las' night. And the night before."

He said nothing.

"Nightmares, Mr. Todd. And I never been one for the nightmares. Scarcely ever 'ave any dreams at all, in fact. But these…it's like they've come at me right out o' the woodwork."

Sweeney tried to keep his mouth firmly shut in stoic silence as he usually did, but he had discovered that to be becoming harder and harder in the last few days.

"What was it about?" he grumbled. Mrs. Lovett rose to her feet and came to stand beside him at the fire.

"Oh…things you might expect. Ol' Judge Turpin, rest 'is soul, clutchin' onto me with those bloody 'ands and those terrible eyes, beggin' to me like I was 'is own bloody mother. I'll never forget that face, Mr. T, not that 'orrible face, lookin' up at me…"

A short silence passed between them. Sometime during it Mrs. Lovett stepped closer to Sweeney and let her head fall on his shoulder. He stood like a statue, showing no sign he even noticed her. He did the same thing whenever she came at him with her little gestures of affection; by now he was so good at ignoring them he never even felt the temperature in his face rise anymore.

"Mr. Todd," she said quietly after a moment.

Sweeney shook his head inwardly. He knew she couldn't keep that mouth of hers closed for more than a minute. She was the chattiest woman he had ever known.

"Mr. Todd."

"What," he muttered.

"I been thinkin', Mr. T." She waited for him to speak. He rolled his eyes--just barely.

"About what."

"'Bout you. And me. And the boy."

Something in her voice made him turn and look at her. Her white, milky skin glowed yellowish gold in the firelight, the flames dancing in her deep brown eyes and her hair looking redder than normal. Sweeney mentally shook himself and looked away, shutting out the strange soft weight of her head on his shoulder.

"I been thinking 'bout what's to become of us."

"Us," Sweeney parroted blankly.

"Think of us, Mr. T," she continued softly. "There's your old Judge Turpin, dead as a doornail, and your Beadle as well, moldering up an awful stink down in the bake 'ouse, and there's your dear little Johanna run away, eloped all safe n' sound with 'er lad Antony, no more worry about 'er…and there's poor Toby lyin' on the chaise with Lord knows what rattlin' about loose in 'is little brain…and 'ere's…and 'ere's you, and me, Mr. Todd. And what's to become o' the two of us?"

"Us," he growled again, a slight edge to his voice.

"Did you ever think about what would 'appen _af_ter you'd killed your judge, Mr. T?"

Sweeney stopped. He parted his lips to reply, but no words would come. And the thought suddenly delved deep and struck hard inside him; he never had. He had always thought, subconsciously perhaps, that killing the judge and at last avenging his wife and child would be something like dying himself. Once it was done, everything would be done…he would simply cease, the world would cease, there would be nothing else. But the woman on his arm proved differently. There he was, still standing before her fireplace, and there she was, Mrs. Lovett, standing beside him. They were both still there.

Mrs. Lovett hooked one corner of her mouth in a disdainful frown.

"Listen to me…of course you didn't. Should 'ave known, great useless thing--never a practical thought in your 'ead."

Sweeney looked at her sharply, then back at the fire. A question he had been wanting to ask her for several days rose quietly to his lips.

"Why haven't you made away with judge and the beadle the way you have all the others?"

Mrs. Lovett straightened, her eyes moving uncomfortably. She folded her arms and stepped away from the fireplace, looking into the mirror above her vanity. Sweeney stole a glance at her and tilted one eyebrow at the strange expression he saw reflected in her mirror. It wasn't quite sadness, but her eyes were dreary and her lips were turned down.

"Well," she muttered, clearly trying to sound sturdy and failing. "The thing of it is…I been thinkin' bout that too, Mr. T."

For once, he let himself look at her, waiting for her to continue.

"I been thinkin'…maybe…now that you've 'ad your revenge, and alls been put right with your old wrongs…I been wondrin' if maybe…we ought to be done with it and call it a finished business."

Sweeney stared at her, his eyes narrowed. "Finished business," he muttered with the hint of a question.

Mrs. Lovett nodded. "Just a thought I 'ad. Don't think I'm complainin' about me own idea, Mr. T, I'm not. I never had such good business in me life. It's just, well…there ain't no more need, ain't there? We got plenty o' money put away from the pie shop, and you got nothin' to be keepin' your arm warm for, anymore…don't you think we'd just as well get out of it, while the gettin's good, I mean?"

She turned and looked at him, and their eyes met. Sweeney blinked and turned away, but his face was wrought in a thoughtful frown he couldn't erase. He thought of the barbershop upstairs, the floors and the walls and the windows that he had scrubbed blood off of countless times; he thought of all the men--he didn't know how many, he had never kept track--who had sat down in his chair, never to rise from it again; he thought of the fires burning and the blood streaming into the drains in the bake house below, and the piles of stained shoes and clothes and the bones buzzing with flies; he thought of Mrs. Lovett, her face smiling and cheery as she strolled through the garden dining tables, serving her pies and laughing and chattering with the customers as pleasant as could be, and taking great care to clean her hands every time she came up from the dark, hot dungeon below; lastly, he thought of his friends, his smooth, glistening, silver friends sitting upstairs, tucked quietly in their velvet lined case. He had told them they could rest, now. They deserved a rest.

…_sleep now, my friends…sleep now, the untroubled sleep of the angels…_

Sweeney didn't move from his statue position by the fireplace, his arm leaning against the mantle and the flames licking in his eyes. He remained stone-still as he spoke.

"A finished business."

He felt, rather than saw, Mrs. Lovett smile with relief. It was fascinating, sometimes, how that woman could read straight to the heart of his cryptic vagaries.

"I know it's for the best, Mr. Todd. B'sides, we've got our little Toby to think of as well."

Sweeney bristled at the mention of the boy's name, and his fingers flexed involuntarily. He was not accustomed to having his victims escape him; the incident with the three of them in the bake house still burned angrily in his mind.

"What will you do with him?" he growled.

"Leave it to me, sir, I'll think o' somethin'. Goodness knows when the poor thing'll wake up, anyhow, and there's no tellin' what 'e'll say or think when 'e does…no worries, sir, I'll set 'im straight. 'E won't be no bother at all."

Sweeney grunted. True to form, once Mrs. Lovett's spirits were raised again, there was no shutting her up; he groaned almost inaudibly as she began pacing the room jabbering happily, half to him and half to herself.

"Of course, there's still the question of what we'll do, now we ain't goin' to be in the meat pie business no more. Course we still got those two old bags 'o bones lyin' down in the cellar…we'll 'ave to see to them. Ain't nothin' a nice pop in the oven won't cure, though…incinerate 'em right up and leave nothin' be'ind. Ain't it exciting, Mr. T? I think a good change of vocation's exactly what we need round here. Nice change of pace'll brighten us all up, you'll see."

Sweeney got a prickling sensation in the top of his stomach and closed his eyes. He knew where this was going.

"You know what I'd like to do, Mr. Todd? Since we're so snug financially, for the time bein'? D'you know where I'd like to go, just for the summertime, per'aps?"

"The sea," Sweeney groaned.

"The sea," Mrs. Lovett sighed. "That's right, Mr. Todd. Oh, don't you think so, Mr. Todd? Wouldn't it be grand?"

The barber said nothing, but lifted his free hand and began massaging his closed eyes with his fingers. That woman…

"Just a thought, nothin' more," she said. "No need to rush off anyplace. It's just nice, is all, to dream about…"

Sweeney suddenly went rigid. She had eased herself very, very close to him. He darted his eyes to her, and swallowed thickly when he saw her big brown eyes staring adoringly up at him. She entwined her arms around one of his, leaning up against him. He stood like a wooden board, staring almost nervously.

"Come on, love," she whispered. "Smile for me, won't you?"

Sweeney swallowed again, wet his lips, and painfully forced his mouth to turn up, his teeth clenched. Mrs. Lovett sighed blissfully.

"It's a new day, my love. A bright new day, jus for you and me."

She stood up on tiptoe, her lips in his ear.

"Give us a kiss."

Sweeney's forced smile cracked. He shifted anxiously and wet his lips again. Mrs. Lovett closed her eyes expectantly, and much to his dismay, he felt the temperature rise in his face. _Damn it._

Sweeney looked dismally at the pale face inches from his. Struggling, cringing, his face twisting in a distasteful pucker, he leaned in and evaded her mouth at the last second, just barely touching her cheek with his lips. The peck was lightning fast. He pulled back like he'd been burned, looking away and rolling his jaw.

Mrs. Lovett opened her eyes, beaming. She was about to speak when suddenly, a noise from the next room interrupted her, and their attention was instantly drawn to the closed door.

_Thump. _It was a sound like something of moderate weight falling on the floor. Inwardly, Sweeney breathed an enormous sigh of relief. He turned and looked at Mrs. Lovett, and she nodded seriously at him. She released his arm, tiptoed around him, and slowly, carefully opened her bedroom door.


	3. Chapter 3

_Chapter 3_

_The Barber of Fleet Street Again_

or

_Toby Is Lied To…Again_

Nellie Lovett opened the door to her bedroom and stuck her head out, peering into the fire-lit sitting room. Her heart jumped when she saw Toby groggily sitting up, blinking and touching his bandaged head. The _thump _they had heard was his shoe falling off his foot as he squirmed. The boy sat up for a moment, then seemed to swoon from dizziness and fall back on the chaise.

Nellie darted back in her room and shut the door noiselessly.

"It's Toby!" she hissed, her mind working furiously. She paused an instant, then grabbed Mr. Todd by the shoulders and pushed him to sit down on her bed. He opened his mouth to speak, but she cut him off.

"Now don't make a fuss, love," she whispered tensely. "You just sit tight in here and I'll go n' talk to the boy. Not to worry, I'll put it all to rights. Just keep nice and quiet and leave it to me."

She left him with a quizzical look in his dark eyes, sliding into her dressing gown as she stepped quietly out the door and closed it behind her.

Toby's eyes were open, squinting blearily toward the lit fireplace. She walked softly towards him, smiling gently and bending over him.

"There's my darling," she whispered, stroking his head. "There's my Toby."

"What's the time, mum?" Toby mumbled, waking slowly from his nearly four day long sleep.

"Shhhh. It's late, Toby, very late. Don't you worry about it."

The boy sat up again, propping himself on the arm of the chaise sofa. He put a hand to his bandaged head and winced.

"What's 'appened?" he asked, his voice slowly strengthening back to the young boyish vigor she remembered. Nellie smiled, a faint tremor of sadness passing through her. She was overjoyed that the boy had finally awakened, but her happiness was muffled with the painful inevitability that she must again lie to him.

"Why dearie, don't you remember?" she cooed, sitting down beside him and putting her arms around him. He leaned against her, his head resting on her chest.

"Remember what? I don't…I don't know, mum…everything's all hazy-like."

She swallowed discretely. "How much _do_ you recall, love?"

Toby screwed up his face, thinking. "I remember coming in to see you, here by the fire. I'd…just run an errand for Mr. Todd, I think."

Nellie's heart leapt to her mouth. _Please, Toby…_she hoped desperately, _please don't remember…_

"I think…I thought…I had something to tell you, mum," he muttered. He was tense with the effort of thinking…then he exhaled, his body deflating and relaxing, and Nellie suppressed a sigh of relief. "I s'pose it was nothing."

"Poor Toby," Nellie said softly, kissing him on the forehead. "You had a fall, dear."

"A fall?"

"I took you down to the bake house with me, don't you remember? You were going to learn to 'elp me make the pies. You got so excited you made a dash at the stairs n' tumbled right down, like a regular little 'Umpty Dumpty. Bashed your poor 'ead on the door n' put you to sleep for near four days now."

"Four days?"

"That's right."

Toby began fidgeting with his fingers, turning closer toward Nellie.

"That means you've been left to run the shop all by yourself, mum."

Nellie hesitated, then nodded. "Well that couldn't be 'elped, now, could it?"

"No."

"It weren't no trouble, love. Business been slow these past few days."

"It 'as?"

"Yes, I'm afraid so. There's somethin' I been meanin' to tell you, Toby. We ain't goin' to be in the meat pie business no more."

Toby's eyes widened in surprise. "Ain't we? Whatever for, mum?"

"Well, I been thinkin' long n' 'ard on it, n' I noticed things been slowin' down a bit. Folks don't seem to want a nice juicy meat pie quite like they used to. So we're goin' to branch out, we are, try all sorts of new things, see if we can't broaden our enterprise a bit. We'll try fruit pies, I think, they'll be the ticket. Got a nice bargain with the grocer already set up for preserves through the winter."

"Oh," Toby murmured. "You been busy while I was sleepin.'"

Nellie nodded. "Can't say I 'aven't."

"'N you been left all alone to do it. I'm sorry, mum, I…"

"Oh, hush now! We'll have none o' that. You've not done anythin' wrong at all."

"But I…"

"Shhhh. Not another word, now. You just sit and rest. Poor thing…I was afraid I weren't never goin' to get my little Toby back. We had the doctor in to see you and the 'orrid blighter told us there weren't no 'ope at all."

"No 'ope?"

"Of you wakin' up same as you'd been before. Shows what 'e knew, eh? Lord, but I'm glad you're not 'urt, darlin'." She kissed him again, and he smiled.

"Thank you, mum."

"Come, now. You know I'd never let anythin' 'appen to my Toby. Not while I'm around."

Toby settled his head back down, and Nellie let her eyes stray to the bedroom door. Her heart jumped when she saw Mr. Todd's black, sunken eye piercing her; the door was opened a tiny crack, and she could just see the pale glow of his face peering through it. Slowly, so as not to disturb Toby, she nodded her head. The eye stared for a moment longer; then the door was shut silently and it vanished from sight.

Sweeney's throat was dry. He swallowed hoarsely and forced himself to smile, looking as gentile and welcoming as possible. The man who had just stepped into his grey, second-floor parlor hung his coat and hat on the peg near the door and approached the chair without hesitation, loosening his tie and collar as he did. He sat down and pointed his face expectantly forward.

"Just a shave, today, barber."

Sweeney inclined his head. "Right you are, sir."

He took the white smock from his arm and whipped it skillfully around the man's front; it floated, suspended in the air, for a brief moment before drifting down and settling over him. Sweeney kept his eyes glued to the side of the man's unsuspecting face as he reached behind him for the cup of lather. He stirred it briskly, and narrowed his eyes at a strange rattling sound; his hand was shaking. _His _hand was shaking. He swallowed the urge to growl in his throat and passed the brush smoothly across the man's face, lathering him from chin to cheek. He took up the razor and held it to his eyes, the pale morning sunlight flashing against it in blinding silver.

An image burned in his mind, a memory reflected in the blade…a chest, sitting against a wall, the lid scarcely a hair's width ajar…but plenty wide enough to catch his attention…

He shook himself, forbidding the scene from playing. He quickly turned and positioned the cocked razor in his hand, leaning over and gently tilting back the man's head.

He pressed the blade to the bare, waiting throat…it indented the firm, rosy skin…Sweeney's heart began to race, his brow threatening to perspire despite the harsh chill in his barbershop…his hand waited…waited…over the jugular…the life beating, beating…waiting…

_Scra-a-ape. _He made the first pass, as smooth and silky as a cloth gliding over glass.

Sweeney straightened up and wiped the blade on his apron. His jaw was clenched, blood pounding in his ears. He forced his hand to steady as he shaved stroke after stroke on the man's jaw, the stubble and white foam gliding away and leaving clean, velvety skin.

He finished the shave, removed the smock, and draped it over his arm. His face was grim and blank as he handed the man a mirror and went back to his table, staring down at the surface.

"Capital," the man was muttering amazedly to himself as he stroked his face. "Simply exquisite."

He stood up, setting the mirror down and tying his collar in place.

"It's true what they say, my good man! You are, without scruple, the finest barber in the city. Nay, in all of England, I daresay!"

"Thank you sir," Sweeney mumbled tonelessly without turning around.

"You'll be seeing me again very soon, I assure you. And here's a little something extra for you…for the closest shave I have ever received." He placed the money on the vanity table. Sweeney didn't look at it.

"You are too kind sir."

The new bells on the door jingled merrily, and the customer was gone down the stairs, leaving Sweeney alone in his parlor. He stood there, staring into the mirror. Those bells had been Mrs. Lovett's idea. Give the place a bit of cheery atmosphere, she'd said. He _hated _those bells, every clang and jangle and jingle was like another nail scraping against the blackboard of his brain. He glanced down at his right hand. It was still trembling.

_Two weeks, _he thought to himself. _Two weeks, and my bloody hand still shakes._

A fear was growing in Sweeney Todd. Fear was not something he was used to, not in himself. He was a wizard at causing _oth_ers fear, he could do that in his sleep; dealing with fears of his own was another matter. For almost fourteen days, he had taken up a mask and tried to fit his face to it, tried to force himself back into an old life that was too small for him, too fragile, and now he was being suffocated, gasping for air as seams ripped all around him. He was a barber again, a simple barber and nothing more…the best barber in Fleet Street, in London, in the world, they said. But he was dying, he was dying slowly from the inside. Sweeney looked at his own face in the mirror, and to his complete horror, discovered there was a light shining in his eyes. Immediately he passed his hand over the bright spots, pulling away the moisture.

_No. No. No no no no. _He would not. He would _not._

Sweeney moved away from the vanity and went to the window. He let his arms hang loosely at his sides as he looked out over the smoking chimneys and bustling, cobbled streets of the city.

_How can I go back? _he asked silently into the emptiness. _How can I go back and pretend as if I'm one of them again?_

He should have died. He should have killed himself and died along with Judge Turpin. That would have been the answer. His revenge was complete, he should have ended it, could have ended it, so easily…one quick slit was all it would have took, and he could have slipped silently down to hell where he belonged, and lain there for all eternity at least knowing that he ended it exactly as he should have. But now…look at him. Here he was, lingering in a world where people talked and laughed and held hands with their lovers and children, where people bought toffees and flew kites and watched birds winging from the rooftops. He felt ridiculous. He could no more be a part of that world than a fish could learn to fly. He was lost, purposeless. What reason did he have to live, now that his vengeance had been taken?

Inevitably, Sweeney's eye turned to the razor sitting on the tabletop. His fingers twitched.

_No. I won't._

The delicate silver blade gleamed in the pale light.

_No. They will rest now. Sleep now, forever._

Gleaming, gleaming, shining, red…

_No!_

Mrs. Lovett…his dear, damnable Mrs. Lovett, his practical, devoted, dauntless woman…her eyes, so wide and dark, so unlike Lucy's had been…

The boy, Toby…her pet…she would never let him go, he would be the death of them both, Sweeney knew it…did he even care anymore?

Johanna…his Johanna…she was gone, gone and he had never once seen her all grown up. Never touched her, never held her, never heard her speak, not even once…she was gone forever, gone with her Antony…

_No…_

There was a voice, a small voice calling, singing and crying out tenderly…the razor flashed in the corner of his eye, its voice called to him…his friend, his lucky friend…

_No…get out, while the getting's good, she had said…get out, get out….No!_

Red fountains…a purpose, his purpose…

Calling to him…_Sweeney…Sweeney…_

The chair, the mirrors, the room, the razor, all calling, louder and louder, all talking and calling to him…

_Sweeney, our Sweeney…_

_No, no, he said…_

Calling, singing…_Sweeney, our Sweeney, our demon of Fleet Street…_

_No…it's done with…sleep…sleep now forever…_

…_our Sweeney, Sweeney, Sweeney…._

_No…the untroubled sleep of the angels…Lucy…Johanna…_

_Sweeney Sweeney Sweeney Sweeney…. _

_No…_

Calling, singing, screaming, spraying, fountains…

_Sweeney…._

_No!_

_Sweeney…_

_No…_he was weak, falling, starving, suffocating…babies, mothers, wives, pies, love and the people who still knew what it was, they were killing him, drowning him, he didn't fit, he couldn't fit, couldn't breathe…

_Sweeney, Sweeney, the barber of Fleet Street…_

Singing, singing, screaming, always screaming!

_No…_

Babies, mothers, wives, pies, Mrs. Lovett, Mrs. Lovett…

_Sweeney, Sweeney, Sweeney Sweeney Sweeney Sweeney…_

"Mr. T?"

"NO!" he roared, covering his ears with his hands and doubling forward, striking his forehead on the glass. A startled cry sounded, and he opened his eyes. He was back in his quiet barbershop, panting for breath. The floor spun beneath him.

Mrs. Lovett appeared at his side, her hands moving to his shoulders.

"Mr. Todd? What on earth are you shoutin' about? I can 'ear you goin' on downstairs as clear as if you was…"

"Shouting?" he echoed weakly.

"Yes, shoutin'," she said sternly, easing him up to stand straight. He slowly lowered his hands and stared out the window. "You kept cryin' out _no, no, no, _over n' over like you was talkin' with someone. You weren't talkin' with someone, were you Mr. T? Your customer left, I sor 'im."

He didn't answer. Mrs. Lovett's voice sounded distant and far off. The razor sat innocently on the table, gleaming, smiling at him. A hand suddenly reached up and touched the side of his face, stroking comfortingly. He didn't so much as blink.

"Mr. T," Mrs. Lovett said, concern writ in her voice and her face. "Are you sure you're ok?"

A shiver went through him, like a flush of cold water, and the heat and fear and frenzy drained from him and he went dead and leaden again, as he always did.

"Yes. I'm sure."

She wasn't so easily fooled. Her hand cupped his jaw. "You'd tell me if you needed my 'elp, love, wouldn' you?"

"Of course," he answered.

She took her hand away. She was frowning. It was obvious she saw through him.

"I been doin' extraordinary business downstairs today," she muttered absently, looking around, brushing a bit of dust off the barber chair. "Turns out there's somethin' to be said for a loyal clientele, after all. All those dandy folks what came for Mrs. Lovett's meat pies 'ave come back for 'er fruit pies, too. Makes me feel like a right proper lady, buyin' me ingredients all straight and respectable-like, now we've got the money. And I can't tell you what a lovely change it is choppin' up all those apples and peaches instead of…"

"Wonderful," Sweeney droned, interrupting. Mrs. Lovett sighed.

"I thought it would do you a bit o' good to get back in the ol' saddle, Mr. T. But I been wrong before."

He didn't answer.

"If this ain't…I mean…if this don't make you _hap_py, anymore, dear…"

_Happy. _The word struck him, stamped in his mind like a boot in his face.

"Happy?" he repeated, staring incredulously. _Happy, she said. Happy…little fool…_

"You're a barber, Mr. T. It's what you are. Or…"

The tone of her voice changed and made him look at her. Her eyes were cast down, her back to him. He stared at the back of her head, his face puzzled. How much did she know? How much could she really see?

"…maybe it's only what you were," she finished, still turned away. Her voice was heavy and sad. "People change. You've changed. I've changed. There ain't no sense in doin' anythin' what don't make you 'appy, love."

He watched her, fascinated, in silence. After another short moment she spun around quickly, all smiles and cheer again, and sniffed once, dusting her hands off and putting them on her hips.

"Well! No sense goin' on with all this mindless pratterin', is there? I got me customers to tend to, n' you 'ave yours, sir. I'll bring your lunch up in just a bit." She turned to leave.

Sweeney heard a voice say her name, and to his utter shock, he realized it was his own.

"Mrs. Lovett."

She looked back. "Yes, love?"

His mouth hung open for a moment, staring at her, his mind suddenly blank. He shook himself and closed it.

"Nothing."

Mrs. Lovett shrugged, smiled knowingly, and left.

Sweeney stood, watching the door where she'd been. A sneer curled on his lip and he turned back to face the window.

"To hell with her," he muttered darkly. A woman and her son walked by in the street below, their fingers laced protectively as they darted carefully between carriages. Sweeney glared. "To hell with them all."


	4. Chapter 4

_Chapter 4_

_Mrs. Lovett's Woes_

or

_The Letter_

The moment Nellie stepped back into her pie shop, the first thing she did was make straight for the door and flip the sign from the _Open _side to the _Closed _side. Then she pulled the key from the bosom of her dress and locked both the front and side doors. Then she sat down at the booth, put her face in her hands, and sobbed.

What had she hoped for? What had she expected? That Sweeney Todd would change, just like that, after killing the judge? That completing his vengeance would somehow erase his memory of Lucy Barker like magic? She nearly laughed aloud at herself. What a fool she was, what a pitiful lovesick fool. She had never been a fool in her life, never once before Mr. Todd came to her. She was smart, she was quick, she was a practical woman who had never let herself get caught up in silly sentimentalities like this. She had loved before, she supposed…she must have loved her old Albert, at least once. But she had never felt like _this_ before. She was completely under Mr. Todd's power, and he didn't even know it..._she _was the one who took care of _him, _after all…but she was trapped by him, lured by his invisible spell. She felt like a dog on a leash, a devoted puppy who would return time and time again to trail and pant and lick at its master's feet no matter how cruelly or coldly it was kicked away. She sobbed loudly and let her head drop down and rest on the table. She was in pain, so much pain…but she loved him. Oh, she loved him so much. She smiled bitterly through her tears.

_You and me, Mr. T, we could be alone…You and me, Mr. T, we'll be nice and cozy…by the sea, Mr. T, where there's no one nosy…_

She suddenly threw her head up and laughed. "You n' me, Mr. T!" she cried miserably. "You n' me…together forever…"

"Mum?" a small voice interrupted her.

Nellie jumped in surprise and turned to see Toby standing in the doorway to the parlor.

"Darling!" she gasped, holding a hand to her pounding heart and hastily wiping her tears away. "Blimey, but you gave me ol' bones a fright! I didn' 'ear you come in!"

"I'm sorry, mum," he apologized, crossing the room and kissing her cheek. Nellie smiled weakly.

"Such a silly little thing it is," she patted him on the shoulder. "'Ave you finished your errands like a good boy?"

"Yes, n' I been back a while a'fore you come down from upstairs. I been in the parlor waitin.'"

"There's my good lad."

Toby's young face was marred with a serious frown. He looked down at her in the chair, deeply and thoughtfully.

"Why were you cryin', mum?" he asked gently.

Nellie hesitated. "Oh, weren't no reason at all, my pet. You know 'ow a woman's fancies are."

"It's about Mr. Todd, isn't it?"

Her heartbeat skipped, and a cold freeze jolted through her. She swallowed and touched her hair. "Of course not. Where'd you ever get an idea like that?"

"I just know 'ow cold 'e can be sometimes. I seen the way he treats you, mum, when 'e's in one of 'is sour old moods. I don't blame you for 'avin your feelings 'urt."

Nellie felt the tears threatening again. "Why, Toby, I'm surprised at you. You know as well as I Mr. T's been nothin' but good to us. We mustn't speak of 'im so. E's a good man, 'e is. I'll be fine, pet, jus' fine."

"Are you sure?" he pleaded.

She smiled and stood up, hugging the boy briefly and kissing the top of his head. "Sure as sugar, dearie. No more worries, now."

Toby reciprocated the hug, squeezing her tightly. "I b'lieve you, mum. Are we closin' the shop up early, t'day?"

"Yes, love. I know it's 'ardly noon, but me old knees is achin' somethin' frightful this mornin.' Must be this dreary weather."

"You go n' rest, then. I'll clean up the kitchen," Toby offered eagerly, beaming up at her.

Nellie was suddenly attacked by a wave of grief as she looked into Toby's bright, smiling face. He was so young, so innocent…she ruffled her hand through his hair, and bit back a sob as she felt the shallow lump on the back of his head that would probably be there for the rest of his life.

"What a sweet thing it is. Thank you, dear."

Toby grinned and hurried over to the counter to sweep the flour away and pile the dirty dishes into the wash basin. Nellie went into the parlor and sat down on the chaise, staring listlessly into the fireplace. The fire was always lit now that the cold weather was setting in. She shivered and pulled her shawl tighter around her shoulders, clutching it closed at her chest with one hand. She heard Toby whistling a merry tune as he worked in the kitchen, and she closed her eyes. In her mind, she saw a face…pale, wicked, beautiful, and sad…whistling cheerily in Toby's place as he cleaned a gleaming razor in the morning light. He turned to her, and smiled, and reached out to take her hand.

_Her _hand. Not Lucy's.

_For a moment, _she thought, _just for once…_

Nellie smiled back, and took his hand, and they stood together in her mind, dancing and spinning…and whistling.

It happened on a Monday, the same day that he looked out of his barbershop window and saw fat, feathery snowflakes drifting down. He stood by the glass and watched them as they fell and collected in white blankets in the streets and on the rooftops. There was a time he had loved the changing of the seasons. He used to wait for the first snow as eagerly as a child, just so he could take a little pinch of it in his fingers and run it back inside to Lucy, and hold it to her lips and say, _"Make a wish,"_ and she would giggle and laugh and kiss his fingertips with her eyes closed, and if there was any tiny bit of snow left un-melted after she did, she would squeal happily and kiss his face, whispering, _"My wish came true."_ Now, he watched the white flakes falling past him with a dead, indifferent stare. He felt nothing, not cold, nor heat, nor excitement. He was empty.

A small stack of letters sat patiently on his barbering table. Mrs. Lovett had brought them up and left them there for him that morning. It was a surreal feeling, to be receiving post again. He was so used to not existing, to being a ghost, a shadow with no name and no connection. Now that he was the well-known and highly respected barber of Fleet Street once again, there were things like bills and notices to attend to. Normally Mrs. Lovett handled all the financial implications of the building and the conjoined businesses, but lately mail had been arriving actually addressed to Mr. Todd, and she had told him she would feel intrusive opening it for him. He merely grunted and conceded to having his letters brought up in the mornings. It wasn't as if he cared, anyway.

Sweeney picked up the envelopes and shuffled through them, passing his eyes disinterestedly over the names. Two were junk, one was a bill, one was a public notice from the new Beadle…probably issuing a formal acceptance of his title in light of the unfortunate disappearance of Beadle Bamford, Sweeney couldn't help thinking and smiling to himself at…and then, at the last letter, he froze. The other papers fell from his hand and fluttered unnoticed to the floor. Sweeney stood like a statue, his eyes hard with disbelief, as he stared down at the name written in messy, youthful scrawl in the corner of the envelope.

It was from Antony.

For a long time, Sweeney simply stared at the letter in his hand. No. It couldn't be. It couldn't. Antony and Johanna were gone, disappeared, vanished forever from the face of the earth. He had done his best to make peace with that as an unavoidable fact. They could not send him letters, they could not touch him or talk to him…no, he would not accept that, he would not accept that kind of hope…

Slowly, with his lips parted in a dead, disbelieving stare, Sweeney opened the letter, unfolded it, took a deep breath, and forced himself to read.

_Dear Mr. Todd--_

_I have been meaning to write to you for quite some time, now. I would have sent word to you sooner, but Johanna and I have been having some difficulty settling down…it was only just recently that we were able to acquire a home stationary enough to write you from. I regret not having been able to say goodbye that night we left…our departure from London was so hurried and perilous, I had no chance to even thank you for all your help. Please forward my utmost gratitude to your neighbor, Mrs. Lovett, as well. You are both true friends, Mr. Todd._

_That is why I felt I must write you this letter. I have reached my wits' end, sir, and I have no one else to turn to for help. It is my bride, my love, my Johanna, sir. She is in terrible grief._

Sweeney paused, a sick, heavy feeling rising in his throat. His eyes lingered on her name before moving on…_Johanna, his daughter…his darling child…_

_I have done everything I can to help her, but it is of no avail. I fear she is losing her senses, Mr. Todd. You see, the moment we were safe in our carriage fleeing from London, she turned to me and burst into torrents of terrified sobbing. She cried to me over and over of a man…a stranger, whom she said she had seen in your barbershop…a man who committed a terrible, grisly murder before her very eyes, and then turned his evil sights on her as well. She claimed only to have been saved by the merest chance…that a moment longer, and the man would have slit her throat where she stood. She was hysterical, Mr. Todd, she screamed and cried in agony as she told me of his face, his horrible face dripping with another poor man's blood. She said she had not seen clearly the face of the victim, but she sobbed for him with all the sympathy a woman can possess. It was all I could do to calm her, and ever since that night she has been a poor shadow of her former self. She wakes at all hours of the night, crying, and during the day she jumps and trembles at the slightest noise. Her beautiful face is marred with the weak frailty of constant fear and sleeplessness, and I am beginning to fear for her health. I have tried to tell her that I believe she suffered from a delusion and nothing more, a hallucination brought on by her terror of the judge and the awful excitement of our escape; I have reasoned with her that there was no man in your barbershop that night but yourself, and that you were a good and compassionate man and could never in all your life do such a thing…but she refuses to be comforted. She says that she can still see his terrible black eyes, that they follow her everywhere…she insists that she saw this man, this demon, and that the memory of his face haunts her every step. I am distraught, Mr. Todd. I must save my beloved Johanna before she wastes away to nothing._

_I wrote to you, hoping that I might request your help. Now that we have finally found a permanent address, you would be able to send us a letter. I beg of you, Mr. Todd…I am not sure what good it may do, if any…but I beg of you to write a letter to Johanna, telling her the truth that I have already said. You know better than any the impossibility of this nightmare she has imagined…I thought, perhaps, if she heard the statement from you, as well, she might bring herself to believe it. Please, Mr. Todd, you are my only hope. I do not know where to turn._

_I have enclosed our new address on a slip of paper, and I must ask you to burn it along with this letter the moment you are through. We have had no trouble from Judge Turpin or the law thus far, but I am as of yet still wary of our position, and the last thing I want is to implicate you as well. Please help her, Mr. Todd. She is the light of my life…I cannot tell you how it pains me to see her so. I would be forever in your debt, sir._

_Your loyal friend,_

_Antony._


	5. Chapter 5

_Chapter 5_

_Sweeney Todd_

or

_Benjamin Barker_

Sweeney looked up. His heart was pounding in his chest. Slowly, he lowered his arms to his sides, and the letter dropped from his hand. He stared forward into space. The room was spinning around him, whirling him, throwing him back into that bloody, vengeful night…

_His friend, his silver friend, glistening with rubies…_

_The chest…the chest against the wall…_

_He felt no change within him…no change…no quickening of his heart, no sharpness of his breath, nothing…when his eyes fell on the terrified looking youth huddled inside it. He smiled._

"_Come for a shave, have you lad?"_

Sweeney was staring at the scene before him, staring at himself…he saw himself opening the chest, smiling at the child inside…he looked like a demon from hell, the blood dripping in congealing veins down his face and his arms…he watched himself drag the boy from the chest, throwing him into the chair…

The boy…

A thin, delicate boy, with pale skin and a gentle, frightened face…too gentle…too soft, too delicate…

Sweeney felt a sharp pain…it was his fingernails, digging into his palms as he clenched his hands into fists…his lip was trembling, his eyes fluttering as if he were about to faint…his vision blurred…

"_Come for a shave, have you lad?" he had said._

_A shave…a shave…_

_Come for a shave…_

He spoke aloud, his voice contorted and soft…

"Come for a shave, have you lad?"

The floor flew up at him. He fell to his knees, hard, pain shooting through his bones…he was on all fours, staring at the floor, his chest heaving…the face, the face, her delicate face…his darling, his angel, his dove, his little girl…it couldn't be, it couldn't be, but it _was…_

_Oh my God…oh my God…oh, God…_

"JOHANNA!"

His scream of despair shook the small room. Sweeney collapsed, crumpling on the floor until his forehead touched the boards; he was sobbing, truly, openly, sobbing, in a way he no longer thought possible for him. His body shook and convulsed as he gasped and choked…he cried her name as the tears ran from his dark eyes…he was falling, dying…he saw her face, Johanna's beautiful face before him in the barber chair, her beautiful eyes, so much like Lucy's, filled with terror, terror _he _had caused…she had been there, she had been right there, and he hadn't even seen her. He had had his baby right there with him, and instead of seeing her and catching her and holding her against his heart, he had put a razor to her throat…and if Mrs. Lovett hadn't screamed when she did…

Sweeney's insides spasmed violently at the thought, jerking and heaving as if he were going to retch.

_Johanna…Johanna…what had he done…oh God in heaven, what had he done…_

The bells jingled. The horrible bells. Footsteps entered the room. Sweeney jerked up, his breath whistling furious and frenzied through his teeth. It was a customer, a middle-aged, mustached man in a dark coat, holding his hat in his hand and looking down at the barber with an expression of utmost concern.

"Good heavens, sir, are you alright?"

The door closed, the bells jingled again.

It was as fast lightning. Sweeney was on his feet in the blink of an eye; in one fluid motion he reached behind him, seized the razor from the table, and lunged at the man, pushing him back and pinning him against the door with the blade pressed to his throat. The man cried out, his breath stifled and choking. Sweeney was glaring, hot, burning rage pouring from his eyes…his chest heaved, his heart raced. He leaned in inches from the man's face, hating him, loathing him, a man who he had never seen before in his life. He snarled out three ragged words through his seething mouth.

"_Forget my face."_

He stood back and slashed the man's throat with one broad, sweeping ark. The razor slid in deep and glided out as smoothly as butter; the throat opened and blood sprayed out, bursting with intense pressure. Sweeney stood still and unflinching as the liquid rubies spattered across his eyes, ran down his face and dripped from his chin. The walls and the window in the door were streaked with crimson, and the man dragged a trail of blood down behind him as he slid, gurgling, to the floor. His eyes smoldered for a few seconds with the last burning moment of life, then were snuffed out in the dark, liquid stillness of death. Blood continued to drain from his throat, a dark puddle swiftly forming around him.

Sweeney turned and staggered away from the body without looking back. The razor dropped from his hand and clattered on the floor; he blinked and wiped his hand over his eyes, smearing the blood. He was gasping, his breath was ragged, he couldn't get any air. He stumbled over to the barber's table, knocking into it and holding himself up on the counter…he was dizzy, why was he so dizzy? He was lightheaded and weak and…afraid. He was actually afraid. He was cold and shaking like a leaf as he looked up into the mirror in front of him. When he saw his reflection, he screamed. He reeled back, staggering into the barber chair and gripping it for dear life. He gasped for breath, paralyzed with terror as he looked at the face staring back at him from the mirror. It was a face he had not seen…a face no one had seen…in a long, long time.

Benjamin Barker stared back at him, his eyes wide with fear and his features contorted in horror. Sweeney blinked. So did Barker. He blinked again. He wiped more crimson liquid from his eyes and blinked repeatedly, but the image remained, watching him. Gone from the glass reflection were his dark eyes, his wild black mane with it's single white streak, his pallor as pale and lifeless as a drowned corpse. Instead, it was Barker's healthy, sun-warmed skin that was covered in blood; it stained the front of his handsome waistcoat, it dripped from the curly ends of his trimmed brown hair. The precious rubies that he was so accustomed to seeing on the visage of Sweeney Todd looked foreign and gruesome on the face of Benjamin Barker. It was the most horrific thing he had ever seen.

Slowly, Sweeney moved forward, watching as Benjamin's face drew closer and closer. He raised a trembling hand and touched the mirror. Benjamin Barker mimicked him. He touched his face, his hair, his eyes. Benjamin Barker did the same. Sweeney slowly shook his head and stepped back. He couldn't move. He stood there, trapped, and stared helplessly into the face of man who had been brought back from the dead after fifteen long years.

Nellie shivered and pulled her shawl tighter around her shoulders. Her footsteps crunched smartly in the newly fallen snow as she made her way down Fleet Street, the brisk winter air nipping at her already pink and running nose. She sniffed loudly and tightened her grip on the parcels in her hand.

_I'm gettin' too bloody old for this, _she thought crossly as she sneezed once and sniffed again. _How I'd love to be down by the warm, sunny sea right this moment…_

Nellie at last reached the pie shop, shuddering and closing the door swiftly behind her as she hurried inside. The shop was closed this early on Mondays, but she would open it up at eleven o'clock, in an hour or so. After brushing the snowflakes from her hair and hanging her shawl on a peg, she quietly popped her head into the parlor to check and see if Toby was still napping by the fire, which he was. She sighed contentedly as she went into the kitchen and put the kettle on. She did like the snow, even if it was bloody frigid to walk in. She had always liked the snow, ever since she was a little girl; not as much as the seaside, of course, but it was pretty, in its own way. It made her want to lay down and sleep by the fire.

Perhaps twenty minutes later, Nellie pushed the rear door to the pie shop open with her back, both hands clutched tightly in the handles of a silver tea tray. A pale line of steam wafted up from the delicate mouth of the teapot, the little painted tea cups rattling on their saucers as she walked. She made her way up the outdoor staircase to Mr. Todd's second story barbershop, humming a little tune to herself as she went.

…_think how snug it'll be underneath our flannel, when it's just you and me and the English channel…in our cozy retreat kept all neat and tidy, we'll have chums over every Friday…by the sea…_

"Mr. T?" she called, rounding the top of the flight. "Teatime, Mr. Todd, lovely, pipin' hot…"

Nellie broke off into a sharp gasp as she came upon the door. Her mouth dropped open and the tea tray fell to the ground with a great crash, the crockery smashing and tea spilling everywhere. She didn't even look down at the mess around her feet; her eyes were fixed in utter shock at the running red smear on the inside of the glass.

Without a moment's hesitation she kicked aside the remains of the tea tray and threw herself on the door, but it was stuck with something heavy, and she could just barely push it open wide enough to squeeze through. The instant she stepped in her foot splashed in something thick and sticky; she looked down and shrieked sharply at the limp body lying on the floor in a puddle of blood. She reeled away from it into the room, the door closing shut and the bells jingling. She had her mouth covered with one hand, the other pressed over her heart.

"Mr. T?" she cried, turning around. "Mr. T, you in 'ere?"

She spotted him immediately, but he was not at all where she expected to find him. Instead of slouching contentedly in the chair or standing and gazing wistfully out the window, as he usually was after cutting someone's throat, he was curled up in a ball on the floor, tucked in the corner behind his barbering table. Nellie walked toward him, puzzled shock writ on her face. Her heart gave only the slightest jump when she saw the bright crimson blood all over him; she had seen it many times before, after all. What disturbed her far more was the way he was sitting there; he was holding his knees almost in a fetal position, his face hidden, and he was rocking himself gently back and forth, gasping and whimpering quietly.

"Mr. T? Are y'alright?" she said softly. She crouched down and touched him lightly on the arm. "Mr. T, what on earth's 'appened in 'ere?"

Nellie had long since learned from experience not to expect any immediate reaction to her questions from Mr. Todd…so she nearly jumped out of her skin when he jerked his head up right away and looked at her. The look on his face was like none she'd ever seen before; he was terrified, scared senseless…his eyes were wide and frantic, his whole body trembling…Nellie saw a small light shining in his eyes, and she squinted and leaned in closer, not daring to believe it…but there it was, undeniable. Mr. Todd was crying. His tears had washed two clean streaks down through the blood on either side of his face. He whimpered and shook as he looked up at her.

"Mr. T," she whispered. She felt her heart breaking at the fear in his eyes, but she was too stunned to have any idea what to say to him. Then, without warning, he pulled away from her, pushing himself even tighter into the corner and staring in frenzied terror.

"Run away!" he cried.

"Calm down, love, calm down," she urged.

"You don't understand!" Mr. Todd sobbed. There was something different in his voice. It was lighter, clearer, almost…younger. "You must run! You must get away from me now!"

"Easy, love! What are you talkin' about?"

"I just _killed _a man!" he wailed. "Don't you _see _him lying there?? I killed him without even knowing it! I may kill you too! For the love of God, woman, _get away from me!"_

Something sparked in Nellie's brain, some small wisp of memory, and her lips parted slightly as the thought began to turn.

_No, _she thought. _It's not possible._

"Mr. T," she said gently, but firmly. "Look at me."

"NO! Get away, before I--!"

"Shhh. Hush. Look at me. Mr. T, who am I?"

"Don't you see?? I _killed _him!"

"_Who am I, _Mr. Todd?"

Sweeney swallowed, cringing into the wall as if he wanted to vanish through it.

"I don't know, woman, I've never seen you before! I don't know _any_thing, I've gone mad and I've murdered a man…where am I? Have I died? Is this hell? What's happened to this room? This…this is my daughter's room! Where is my Lucy? Where is Johanna? TELL ME! Where are my wife and child??"

Nellie stared, a cold stillness settling in her heart. She let go of his arm and leaned back, her eyes dampening with pity and a disbelieving sadness.

"Oh, Mr. Todd," she whispered. "Oh, love…"

"Who _are _you?" he cried. "Who is Mr. Todd?"

Nellie fought to keep her composure, forbidding the tears to fall from her eyes. At the same time she felt a strange pang of jealousy at his mention of Lucy and Johanna. "Listen to me carefully, love. What is your name?"

He shook and swallowed and tried to wipe the blood from his face with his hands, which did little good since they were equally bloody.

"B-B-Benjamin B-Barker."

Nellie couldn't help it. The tears fell. She closed her eyes and let them stream down as she lowered to her knees and put her arms around the trembling man. He whimpered, but didn't struggle against her.

"Oh, Mr. Todd. My poor darling…shhhh…shhhh….there, there, love…hush, hush now…"

To her great surprise, Sweeney accepted her embrace, leaning into her and burying his face in her neck, the blood covering him sticking wet and tacky to her skin. She shushed and comforted him, rocking him gently as he continued to cry.

"I'm here, love. I'm here. Shhhhh."

In time, his trembling sobs lessened, then stopped altogether. He grew still and silent; he seemed almost to fall asleep in her arms. Then, after what felt like an eternity, he stirred, and Nellie's eyes shot open as his voice spoke, familiar and deep, muffled and hot against her neck.

"Mrs. Lovett," he rumbled blankly.

She slowly pulled back and looked at him. His eyes were dark and pleading and confused…the eyes she knew so well, the eyes of Sweeney Todd.

"You're back," she gasped. "Mr. T, is it really you?"

He said nothing, but the grim look on his face reminded her of their close proximity; she timidly let go of him and stood, hooking her arms around his waist and pulling him to his feet. He rose weakly, stumbling as she guided him across the floor and sat him down in the barber chair. Once seated, he stared forward like a stone statue.

"Mr. Todd, what's 'appened? Are you alright? Why did you do in another one, I thought we'd agreed…?"

"Letter," he mumbled.

"Letter? What letter?" He didn't answer, but she looked about the room and spotted a loose piece of paper lying on the floor. She picked it up and read it, and lifted her hand to her mouth. Her mind was reeling.

"Oh, Mr. T," was all she could say.

The barber said nothing. He sat in his chair and stared into nothingness, the blood drying on his body…tears ran down Nellie's cheeks as she watched him in silence. His face betrayed no sign of it, but somewhere underneath, he was crying. Somewhere underneath was the lost, frightened, despairing heart of Benjamin Barker…Benjamin Barker, who had been dead and was now alive again, who had risen from the grave, and come back to find a monster in his stead.


	6. Chapter 6

Chapter 6

_The Barber's Two Faces_

or

_The Beadle's Successor_

They did it that night, while Toby was asleep. Nellie lit the fire in the enormous oven, stoking and feeding it until it was finally hot enough. She straightened up, wincing from the stiffness in her back and wiping the light perspiration from her forehead. She hadn't had to make a fire that hot for some weeks now, not since they'd disposed of the judge and the beadle…it didn't take nearly as much heat to cook fruit pies as it did meat pies. Then she heard it; the unmistakable sound of Mr. Todd knocking three times on the floor upstairs, to warn her. He must have finished cleaning up the blood. Nellie looked away from the trap-door opening, closing her eyes calmly, but tightly. She flinched when she heard it, the sound of the dead body sliding down the chute and landing with a sickening, neck-snapping thud on the stone floor. Nellie had seen more than her fair share of carnage in the past several months…in fact, she was more accustomed to blood and gore and horrible, revolting sights than any woman should be…but for some reason, that _thud…_she could barely tolerate it. Skin, flesh, bodies, all cut up and ground and put into pies, she could handle…but that _thud _nearly did her in every time.

Moments after the body dropped into the bake house, Mr. Todd appeared in the doorway. He had washed the blood off and he seemed to be in his right mind again, but there was a vague, lost kind of silence to him that was different, somehow. He was carefully avoiding her gaze, as if he didn't want her to even look at him. He crossed the room, rolling up his fresh white sleeves as he went.

"Oven ready?" he grunted.

Nellie nodded. "Nice n' hot."

Mr. Todd hooked his hands beneath the dead man's arms and dragged him over to the blazing oven. With slight difficulty, he hoisted the body up and heaved it into the fire; it fell in limply, the clothes and hair igniting instantly. Mr. Todd closed the heavy door and bolted it, then turned away with his hands resting on his hips, and his head down, his breath a bit heavier than usual.

Nellie watched him worriedly. It was hard to imagine that somewhere inside him, at that very moment, the mind of Benjamin Barker was hiding, perhaps just waiting to spring forth again and overtake him. She took a few gentle steps towards him.

"That's that, I s'pose."

He didn't answer, unsurprisingly.

"Although," Nellie said, moving closer still. "There's still the matter of that letter."

Sweeney Todd's face twitched slightly.

"We can't ignore it, love. You know that lad Antony…'e won't stop at nothin' to 'elp his little bride. If you don't answer 'e'll only write again. 'E may even try n' bring 'er 'ere, if it gets bad enough."

A shadow passed over Mr. Todd's face, and she noticed that a tinge of fear had replaced a portion of his usual glower.

"And what would you have me say?" he growled, lifting his eyes to her.

Nellie smiled, ever so lightly. "What else, love? You'll lie."

To her astonishment, the fear deepened in the creases of his frown. She made a soft noise of comfort and put her hands on his shoulder, rubbing his back gently.

"Now, now…don't fret so. It jus' can't be 'elped, love. I know you miss your Johanna somethin' awful…n' maybe someday, we could even arrange for you t'see 'er…but not now, Mr. T, not now. We can't 'ave 'er Antony learnin' the truth 'bout us, 'e'd go straight to law, you know 'e would. 'E's an upright lad, 'e is. You'll 'ave to write the letter. It won't be no trouble, jus' a little dot 'ere, a dash there, n' we can hush the whole thing up like it never 'appened. I'll 'elp you write it, Mr. T."

His gaze shifted. "It's not that," he muttered, so lowly she could scarcely hear him.

Nellie narrowed her eyes. "What is it, then?"

She saw him weaken visibly, and for a moment she was afraid she would see his tears again, those inexplicable tears that seemed to defy reality.

"She's afraid of me," he whispered.

Nellie's heart sank, and she rubbed his back slower and more gently. "Oh, Mr. T…"

"I almost killed her."

"Mr. Todd…"

"She saw me like…like that. She's terrified of me."

"Now, love, 'ow can she be? She don't even know who you are." The instant the words left her mouth, she winced, wishing she could swallow them up again. _Fool, stupid fool!_

But Mr. Todd only stared in the same sad, empty trance. _"'His face haunts her every step. His horrible face…._that's what he said."

Nellie felt a sharp pang of sadness for him, so sharp she sighed deeply and put her arms around him. Like always, he paid no attention to her. But he was so warm, so still…she closed her eyes and laid her head against his chest, his slow heart beating in her ear.

"Hush, love," she whispered. "Hush now. Don't you worry your poor 'ead no more about it. I'll 'elp you…we'll write the letter for your Johanna, all nice and sweet like, and you'll see, she'll feel all better in no time. She'll forget all 'bout that silly 'ol misunderstandin' upstairs. Don't you fret, Mr. T. I'm 'ere. I'm goin' t'take care of you."

He said nothing, didn't move, didn't speak…but she thought…she thought, maybe, for just a moment…that she felt his head leaning against hers. And then the feeling was gone.

The next three days were like a strange, unending kind of delirium. The next switch came early the morning after they'd disposed of the body; Nellie had come upstairs to bring Mr. Todd his breakfast, and the moment she walked in she knew it had happened again. Mr. Todd was sitting in his barber chair, like usual, but his arms were wrapped around himself and he was rocking jerkily back and forth, leaning forward, pulling back, leaning forward, pulling back. Nellie swallowed and set the tray down, cautiously moving towards him.

"Good mornin,' dear," she said quietly. "'You ok? 'Ow ya feelin' t'day?"

He looked up at her, his face weak and frightened. "Please madam," he whispered hoarsely. "Please…you've got to help me. I don't know where I am."

Nellie kept her face calm. She bent over beside him and put her hand on his shoulder. "Take it easy, there, love. Take it easy."

Mr. Todd wet hip lips nervously. "I can't find my wife," he muttered. "I can't find her. Do you know where she is? Have you seen my Lucy? And Johanna? She's my child…I can't find them…"

"Shhhh," she cooed. "It's alright, love. It'll be alright."

"I can't find them…" he looked back down, rocking harder. "I can't find them…I…I think I may be ill, ma'am…I can't think straight and I'm…I'm so pale…"

"Shhhh."

"I can't shake the feeling that…that I've done something, something awful…I…"

He stopped rocking, his face suddenly going blank. Nellie watched him, waiting. She saw the change happen this time. Slowly, very slowly, his brow narrowed and he sat up straight. He turned his head and looked at her, scowling in confusion.

"Mrs. Lovett…"

She closed her eyes.

"Mrs. Lovett."

"Yes, love?"

"Did I…just…"

She nodded. "Yes, love."

Mr. Todd sat back in the chair, staring forward with a dazed look. "I don't even remember it happening…" he muttered, and she could get nothing more out of him. His breakfast was still untouched when she came up to check on him two hours later.

From there, the pattern of their days became very regular, in a mad, irregular sort of way. Whenever Nellie saw the strange, newly two-edged barber, before she said anything else, she would ask, "You there, love?" and if he grunted soundly in reply, she would know it was Sweeney Todd…but every now and then, at least once or twice a day, he wouldn't reply, and she would notice that his face had changed and he was shaking with fear, and it would not be Mr. Todd before her, but Benjamin Barker, and it was almost always a good fifteen to twenty minutes of jabbering and hysterics and consoling before he would become Sweeney again. It was a terrible tax on her already fraying nerves; she never knew who she was going to find. They wrote the letter to Johanna, just as planned…or rather, Nellie wrote it while Mr. Todd stood staring out the window, mumbling absently in agreement whenever she asked him a question. "Whatever you say," he would mutter without listening, and she would sigh and continue to write.

It was difficult, but they somehow managed to hide Mr. Todd's new problem from Toby. The barber spent nearly all day and night shut away upstairs, and Nellie sent Toby out on twice as many errands as she usually did, and anything that needed to be taken up to the second floor, she took herself, cheerily waving away Toby's protestations about her poor knees.

"Mum," the boy asked on the fourth morning after Barker's inconvenient return from the grave, "Why 'asn't Mr. Todd opened 'is shop all week? Ain't 'e goin to put off 'is customers?"

Nellie paused a moment as she was rolling out her pie dough. Thinking quickly, she clucked her tongue and shook her head at Toby.

"Oh, dearie, I'm afraid our poor Mr. Todd's been laid up sick goin' on five days now."

"Is 'e goin' to be alright? What's wrong with 'im?"

"It ain't nothin' too dreadful, darling, jus' a bit of a bug. Influenza, I'd reckon. Got 'is poor insides all out o' sorts, it 'as. 'E'll be alright, but 'e needs 'is rest, n' we mustn't disturb 'im."

Toby nodded thoughtfully. "But why's 'e stayed all alone upstairs in 'is shop? S'the coldest room in the 'ouse, up there. Wouldn't 'e be better off stayin' down in the parlor, where it's warm?"

Nellie twitched irritably. Sometimes the boy was too smart for his own good. He certainly asked enough questions.

"Oh, you know our Mr. T…'e likes 'is privacy. I tried to talk 'im into stayin' down 'ere with us, but he won't 'ear nothin' of it. No, we'd be best jus' to leave 'im be. Now be a good boy n' run out to market for me…we're nearly all out of bakin' powder."

Toby made a confused face. "Mum, didn' I jus' go out n' get bakin' powder on Wednesday?"

"Yes, darlin', that you did, but business been so ripe lately I've plumb gone through 'alf the supplies, I 'ave. Now be a dear n' run along, there's my good Toby."

"Yes, mum."

Nellie heaved a sigh as the boy hurried out the front door. She dusted the flour from her hands and massaged her forehead, and took a few steps toward the parlor, hoping to have a few moments peace and quiet before the noontime rush in the pie shop…but just as she reached the doorway, she heard a great clattering and banging coming from upstairs--the sound of the heavy black tea-kettle hitting the floor--and immediately after there followed a desperate, miserable wail. _Benjamin Barker, dropped by for brunch, I suppose, _she thought exasperatedly. Nellie groaned and turned around, reluctantly trudging away from the cheery fire in the parlor and toward the back door. It had been hard enough keeping up with two men in her pie shop; it was going to drive her straight to Bedlam having to take care of three.

Sweeney Todd was losing his mind. What little he'd had left of it to lose, at any rate.

His lonely, greyly lit little barbershop was full of shadows, darting here and there and vanishing in the corners, taunting him and playing tricks on his eyes. All around him were noises; creaks, cries, screams, children laughing, women singing…he never knew anymore what was real and what was in his mind. His shop had been closed for a week and a half, and he had not seen another living soul besides Mrs. Lovett in what felt like an eternity; and he only saw her for short, five minute intervals when she brought up his meals, or after she'd awakened him from one of what were swiftly becoming known between them as his "absences." He tried not the think about the fact that more often than not he would awake to find himself in her arms, being held or rocked gently, with tears clouding his eyes.

Benjamin Barker was a persistent ghost. He was starting to crop up more and more, with less and less provocation, and hard as he tried to keep his thoughts about him, Sweeney never saw him coming. He didn't remember anything he did or heard during his "absences," but each time he awoke he found he knew a little more about Barker, or rather, what Barker knew; that he was beginning to suspect, for example, a dark association with the barber's chair and with Mrs. Lovett's constant consolations. Sweeney growled furiously and slammed his fist against the wall, shoulders hunched as he stared out his window. How much longer was this going to keep up? And how many more times was he going to revert back to his former self before the lines between Benjamin Barker and Sweeney Todd became permanently lost? And worst of all…did he even care? Secretly, somewhere deep down inside him, did he want to be Benjamin Barker again?

_No_…he wouldn't, he couldn't…Benjamin Barker was dead, and for good reason. If he allowed himself to slip back into his old life, that life that had revolved completely around Lucy and Johanna…he would never come back. He would be lost forever in a helpless, empty hell.

Not that he wasn't already lost in an empty hell…but at least as Sweeney Todd, he wasn't helpless.

It was Sunday. Mrs. Lovett's shop was closed, and she had given Toby a few shillings and told him he could go to the sweet shop and then play in the snow in the park for as long as he wanted, leaving the two of them alone for the day. It was two in the afternoon, and Sweeney had managed to make it through the day without any of his absences thus far. He was alone in his barbershop, slouching in the chair and gently stroking one of his razors in the light of the window, when Mrs. Lovett suddenly burst into the room. Normally, he would have ignored her, or perhaps been angry with her for intruding on him, but the moment she came in he saw something was wrong. Her pale face had somehow gone even paler, and her brown eyes were wide with fear and adrenaline. She shut the door behind her and put her back to it, her chest heaving as she stared at him.

"What?" he asked, for once in rapt attention, as he rose to his feet.

"It's the law," Mrs. Lovett gasped breathlessly. "Three constables and the new Beadle. They're downstairs and they're askin' to speak with Mr. Todd."

Sweeney's face grew rigid and his eyes narrowed. He felt no fear, but rather a dark, stolid turn of calm fury…the fury of self preservation.

"Send them up," he growled.

Mrs. Lovett looked at him nervously for a few more seconds, then nodded once and left the room. Sweeney looked down at his silver friend, his face reflected in the blade. Somewhere behind those black eyes, he knew, Barker was cowering. He wouldn't allow him to appear…not now. He would keep him imprisoned. In one quick motion, Sweeney folded the razor shut and slid it into the holster at his hip.

Less than a minute passed before there was a knock at the door, and in stepped a tall, thickly built man with a great, curling blonde mustache and a navy blue bowler hat. He carried a cane he didn't need, as was standard procedure for most Beadles, and there was an amber stone set into the handle. His black, polished shoes tapped loudly on the wooden floor, and he held his nose high with a smug look of distaste as he surveyed the room. Behind him were three constables of Scotland Yard in uniform, and behind them was Mrs. Lovett. She closed the door and stood in front of it, her hands folded in front of her heart and a look of frail worry on her face. Despite the demanding presence of the officers in the room, Sweeney had to look past them to glance twice at Mrs. Lovett…her expression was strange, somehow, captivating, and suddenly it dawned on him…she was acting, she was playing the part of the concerned, innocent landlady. He found himself struggling to repress a dark smile, and he felt one of his rare swells of something that was almost like affection for her, like he had that fateful day so long ago when she had first thought of baking his victims into pies. That woman was a bloody wonder, sometimes.

"Mr. Todd, I presume?" the new beadle addressed the barber disdainfully. He had a thin, oily voice, clearer and more prepossessing than Beadle Bamford's had been, but every bit as infuriatingly calm and superior.

"At your service, sir," Sweeney gave a slight bow, his eyes never leaving the Beadle's face.

"A pleasure, I'm sure. My name is Mr. Howard Conner. I am the new practicing Beadle of your district, as my public notice of some time ago doubtlessly informed you."

Sweeney inclined his head. Beadle Conner's fingers flexed around the hilt of his cane.

"I have come here, Mr. Todd, to ask you a few questions. You see, there have been some nasty rumors buzzing here and there concerning you and this establishment."

Sweeney raised his eyebrows innocently. "Rumors, sir?"

"Indeed, rumors. For instance, you may not have heard…my younger brother, Charles Conner, has been missing for nearly eleven days, now. He was tending to some business in Fleet Street the day he disappeared, and we have been conducting searches this past week and half. I have it on the authority of numerous eye witnesses, Mr. Todd, that my brother on that day was seen entering your barber shop, and was not seen leaving it."

Sweeney's heart skipped a beat, but he paid it no mind. Behind the Beadle and the constables, he saw Mrs. Lovett's eyes watching him nervously. His face remained schooled in an expression of perfect honesty.

"My dear sir," he said, his voice incredulous with injury. "You cannot be suggesting that I…?"

"It is exactly what I am suggesting, Mr. Todd," Beadle Conner suddenly snapped, his suave demeanor gone and replaced by fierce, seething anger. "I have been in authority of this district for scarcely two weeks now, and already I have heard my fair share of distasteful stories surrounding your establishment. It has also been rumored, Mr. Todd, that both his honor the Judge Turpin _and _my predecessor, the Beadle Bamford, were seen near and about your barber shop some weeks ago. Have you heard, Mr. Todd, that _they both _are missing as well?"

"I had heard, sir, yes. Most unfortunate news."

Beadle Conner glared darkly, and suddenly raised his cane and pointed it between Sweeney's eyes, hovering a scarce few inches away.

"You will explain yourself, Mr. Todd."

"With all due respect, sir," Sweeney replied quietly. "I am afraid I don't understand. Of what crime am I to be accused, and on what grounds, other than this frail speculation of which you speak?"

"Do not play coy with me!" the Beadle shouted, his proper manner suddenly gone, replaced by sputtering rage. "You are hiding something here, Mr. Todd. We know for fact that Judge Turpin, Beadle Bamford, _and _my brother Charles were all seen associating with you and this place of business, and after doing so, all three of them have vanished into thin air! What have you done with him, Mr. Todd? Where is my brother?"

Sweeney remained calm. He moved slowly away from the Beadle's outstretched cane, making his way toward the window.

"Your brother, sir," he said, his eyes watching through the glass. "Was he a sturdily built man? Medium height, dark mustache, about your same bone structure?"

Beadle Conner made a visible effort of containing his anger. "That is his description to a T. You admit you have seen him, then, Mr. Todd."

"I have. He came to my shop at approximately two o'clock in the afternoon on the day you have spoken. He paid for a shave, which he received. He then left, promptly at two fifteen."

"LIAR!" Beadle Conner erupted.

"Sir," one of the constables muttered cautiously. The Beadle's face fumed and bristled, his eyes glaring at Sweeney in seething anger. He lifted his chin and straightened his coat.

"It is not the business of Scotland Yard to accuse an innocent man," he stated grandly, his cool demeanor returned. "If you have nothing to hide, Mr. Todd, then you have nothing to fear. We will conduct a search of these premises immediately, and if nothing is found with which to incriminate you, we will be on our way."

Sweeney nodded humbly, but his mind was racing furiously, mentally retracing every inch of the house, searching for anything that might serve as evidence for the Beadle. He could think of nothing; except the bake house. Mrs. Lovett had disposed of all of the corpses, he was sure of that…but what of the piles of shoes and clothing that had remained from their earlier victims? Had she thought to burn those? Even worse, what of the countless bones that had once littered the floor? Had they been stored away somewhere? Even the tiniest grisly article left forgotten on the floor could mean a one-way ticket to the gallows for them both. Sweeney grit his teeth silently in calculating thought.

_I have no choice, _he thought, his mind touching on the razor safely concealed in the holster at his hip. _If they find something…anything…I must be ready…they will all have to die._

Beadle Connors and the three constables turned and began filing out of Sweeney's parlor, heading down the stairs towards the pie shop below. As he went to follow them, Sweeney suddenly realized that Mrs. Lovett had disappeared. How long had she been gone? When was she able to slip away without anyone noticing?

_Damned insufferable bitch, _he ground darkly in his mind. He could only hope they wouldn't find her doing anything suspicious downstairs. That woman would be the death of him one day, he just knew it.

Mrs. Lovett was nowhere to be seen, either in the pie shop or any other part of the house. Beadle Connor watched in smug anticipation as the constables turned over every nook and cranny of the building; they threw cushions off the furniture and books off the shelves, they opened every cabinet in the kitchen, pots and pans rattling as they fell to the floor, they emptied canisters of flour and sugar, dumping the contents in messy heaps of powder all over the room. Sweeney stood by and watched in grim silence, his hand never straying far from the holster. He wondered fleetingly just what it was they expected to find among Mrs. Lovett's knickknacks and baking supplies. When searching the house turned up nothing, Beadle Connor led the policeman to the staircase descending into the bake house, a furious flare to his step. Sweeney could not suppress a private smile at the Beadle's incredulous anger at not finding anything with which to incriminate him in the house. As the five of them rounded the corner at the top of the stairs, however, Sweeney looked down and his eyes widened in surprise; for there was Mrs. Lovett, standing below them at the bottom of the steps, muttering to herself and looking over the bake house door as if she were searching for something.

"Madam," Beadle Connor cried indignantly. "You will stand aside and cooperate as we search your bake house."

Mrs. Lovett turned to look over her shoulder, a surprised glow in her wide, brown eyes.

"Well, my good sir, I'd love nothin' more than t'do just that, but I'm afraid it's just not goin' to be possible today."

The Beadle flared. "I beg your pardon, madam?"

"There, you see," Mrs. Lovett took the door handle in both hands and pulled on it with all her weight; the door didn't budge. "It's jammed shut, it is. Third time it's been actin' up this week; bless us if some days we can't make the bloody thing open an inch."

"Out of the way!" the Beadle roared, and Mrs. Lovett darted aside as he and the constables thundered down the stairs and began attacking the door, pushing and pulling and prying at it from all angles. Mrs. Lovett glanced up at Sweeney, still standing at the top of the steps, and shot him a hidden smile. Comprehension dawned on him and for a moment, he found himself staring down at her with a look of puzzled wonder.

Beadle Connor and the policemen struggled and railed at the heavy iron door for almost ten minutes, but could not force it open. When they at last gave up and tramped up the stairs back into the grey wintry sunlight of the pie shop, the Beadle was nearly incoherent with rage. He whirled the fabric of his long coat over his arms and struck his cane fervently on the floor, glaring at Sweeney and Mrs. Lovett with as much accusing fire as he could muster.

"Make no mistake, Mr. Todd, we are far from finished here. I will be returning first thing tomorrow morning with a locksmith and hatchet in tow, and we will search that bake house if it means tearing the door straight from its hinges. Good _day _to you, sir."

And with a final flourish of capes and authority, the four of them left, the bells on the doors jingling to mark their departure, and the ransacked house was once again still and calm.

Mrs. Lovett began walking slowly through her torn apart rooms, shaking her head and clucking her tongue.

"Oh, dear," she muttered dismally, bending over and picking up a shard of crockery from a pile of flour. "Oh, look at my poor little kitchen…they've spoiled it all, the bloody stinking…"

"Mrs. Lovett."

She stopped talking and looked up, her face calm and open. "What is it, Mr. T?"

Sweeney stared at her. He gradually became aware of a small, almost imperceptible smile turning on his mouth, and he narrowed his eyes scrupulously as he gazed into her face. For some reason…some reason he refused to address…there was something different about her, something he had never seen before. She was…clearer, to him. Sharper. It was as if he was seeing her unclouded for the first time, the smooth white of her pale skin, the flyaway red curls piled on her head, the dark plum color of her full-lipped mouth, her deep, watching brown eyes, sunken, like his own…the tiny, almost invisible freckles that peppered the bridge of her delicate nose. He would not…he would _never…_admit it to himself…it was a fluke, a flaw of the moment brought on by the suddenness of their ordeal with the Beadle's successor. No, he would never admit it to himself, never…but for a moment, perhaps…just a single, fleeting moment…he saw something of beauty in her face.

"How did you…?"

Mrs. Lovett grinned slyly, reached into the bodice of her dress and drew out a rusted skeleton key on a burgundy ribbon. She held it at eye level, smirking silently.

Sweeney took a step nearer to her without quite noticing, and when he spoke his voice was low and smiling wickedly.

"My dear Mrs. Lovett. How I lived without you all those years, I'll never know."


	7. Chapter 7

_Chapter 7_

_Farewell to Fleet Street_

or

_Toby Is At Last Told the Truth…At Least, Some of It_

It was past suppertime when Toby finally returned to the pie shop. Nellie and Mr. Todd were in the kitchen, where they'd been brooding and thinking desperately for hours, trying to find a way out of their predicament. They'd been over the situation time and time again, and they kept coming back to the same problem; that even if they scoured the bake house until it was spotlessly clean, the Beadle would still find some way of convicting them. It didn't take a fool to know that in London, when someone in power wanted something done, they would get it done, no matter how they had to lie or cheat to make it happen. The Beadle wanted them swinging from the gallows, and he would do anything he could to get his wish, even if he couldn't find so much as a blood-stained button in the bake house. Nellie jumped when the bells on the door jingled and in rushed Toby, his breath puffing in white clouds and his nose and cheeks cherry-red from the wintry air outdoors.

"I'm back, mum…" he started, then stopped suddenly, his eyes widening as he saw the ransacked condition of the room. He slowly took off his scarf, stepping over piles of broken crockery and other messes as he made his way inside. "Mum, what…what in the world?"

Nellie cast a quick glance to Mr. Todd, who was standing at the other end of the counter. He was looking at her, his eyes dark and menacing. Nellie swallowed; she knew what he really wanted to do with Toby, what he had wanted to do with him all along. She remembered, like some horrible dream, that night in the bake house when he had come so close to killing the boy. She couldn't let it come to that again…she couldn't lose her Toby, she just couldn't.

"Toby," she said quietly, her voice ragged. "Toby, love…there's…there's somethin' I need to tell ya."

"What, mum? Are you alright? What's 'appened 'ere?"

She felt Mr. Todd's eyes widen. He straightened up and his hand immediately went to the holster at his hip. And then, all at once, like a dam bursting, Nellie broke down. She whipped her head to look at Mr. Todd, her lips shut firmly but her body trembling.

"No," she said, staring straight at him. He stared back, his hand frozen at his side. He glared silently in disbelief.

"No more," Nellie whispered defiantly. "I won't lie to 'im anymore."

"Mrs. Lovett…" Mr. Todd growled darkly, his voice and his eyes so fierce and intimidating that she almost backed down; but she swallowed thickly, steeling her resolve.

"I'm going to tell 'im the truth," she said as strongly as she could.

A heavy silence hung for a moment in the kitchen. Toby's confused gaze darted back and forth between Nellie and Mr. Todd as they stared each other down. Nellie felt herself shaking, but she refused to look away. Finally, to her utter surprise, Mr. Todd lowered his hand from the holster. He kept her pinned with a wary scowl, but he calmly crossed the room and sat down in the booth, turning his gaze to stare down at the floor.

"Do what you will," he muttered darkly. Nellie watched him in astonishment.

"Mr. T…" she began, stepping towards him. She wanted to touch him, speak to him, but she didn't know what to say…

"Leave me," he snapped, and she backed off. Maybe, someday, she would know what to say to him.

"Mum, what's going on?" Toby asked again. Nellie turned to him, her eyes wavering. She forced her hands to steady as she took him by the shoulders and led him into the parlor. The furniture and everything else in the room had been ruined by the Beadle and his constables, but the fire in the grate was still crackling, and they sat down on the rug in front of it.

"Toby," Nellie said, facing him directly, the firelight playing off his questioning face. She swallowed and pursed her lips firmly. "There are….things….about Mr. Todd, and I, that you don't know."

Toby stared at her, confusion writ softly in his features. "Things?"

"Yes, love. Things. And some of them…some of them aren't very nice." She wet her lips, and turned to look through the hall at Mr. Todd, but he was sitting hunched over at the table with his back to them, and he didn't move. Nellie looked back at Toby.

"What…what kind of things?" he asked. There was a faint tremor of what sounded like fear in his voice.

Nellie reached out and stroked his cheek tenderly, looking sadly into his wide, boyish eyes.

"Toby, let me tell you a story," she whispered, shifting to the side and putting her arms around the boy's shoulders, drawing him against her. He leaned in, listening quietly. Nellie's heart was beating wildly and she felt her breath catch, but she refused to let herself cry. She squeezed her eyes shut and forced herself to speak.

"_There was a barber and his wife…"_ she whispered. _"And they were innocent…a simple barber and his wife…living a simple little life…and they were innocent…"_

Toby looked up at her, his eyes full of questions. "The barber, mum," he said. "Was 'e…Mr. Todd?"

Nellie felt the tears threatening, and she drew Toby's head back to her chest. "Yes, love," she said. "'E was our Mr. Todd. But 'e 'ad another name, back then. Barker, 'is name was. Benjamin Barker." She looked back in the kitchen; Mr. Todd still had not moved, but she could sense…she didn't know why, but she could sense…that he was listening.

"What happened to them?" Toby asked quietly.

Nellie took a deep breath. "There was this judge, you see," she whispered. "Wanted her like mad…"

"The barber's wife?"

"Yes, love…he lusted for the barber's wife, so he transported him for life…though he was innocent…"

Toby's eyes widened. "Mr. Todd?"

"Yes, love. Mr. Todd."

Nellie squeezed her eyes shut. All of a sudden, the memories became so painful, too painful even to remember…but she went on, and told Toby the whole story…Benjamin Barker's wrongful imprisonment and his transportation to Australia for fifteen years…Judge Turpin's molestation of poor Lucy Barker and his adoption of baby Johanna, and Lucy's suicide by arsenic poisoning. She kept her eyes shut firmly as went on to tell him of Mr. Todd's return. Toby went stiff in her arms when she came to the inevitable moment, the moment that she had somehow always known, in the back of her mind, would one day come…the moment when she told him of Mr. Todd's murders. The boys eyes grew wide as he listened; Nellie tried to brave as went on, telling Toby of the letter that had arrived from Antony and of Mr. Todd's strange new condition. There was a long moment of silence after she finished. She felt Toby trembling, and again felt the sting of impending tears in her eyes.

"Mum," he whispered, his voice shaking and barely audible. "Has 'e…has Mr. Todd…killed…other people, too? More people than the Judge, and the Beadle?"

Nellie opened her mouth, and froze. Toby was trembling so badly in her arms, it shook her whole body. The boy was terrified; he kept shooting quick, furtive glances to where Mr. Todd still sat in the kitchen, and she could feel his heart pounding straight through his chest. And then, the tears that had been fighting and fighting to stream down finally appeared and clouded her eyes, and she stifled an audible sob…because she knew, she knew she would have to lie to him again. She had wanted to tell him the whole truth, she had wanted it so badly, and she was so sure that this time, she would be able to. But the realization came to her all at once; she saw, in her mind's eyes, the bake house, filled with bodies and bones and discarded clothing…she saw the pies steaming on plates and trays as Toby helped her serve them to customers…she saw Toby, her own precious Toby, biting into a pie and smiling at her, and telling her how delicious it was…and she felt a spasm of inconceivable horror. Why? Why had she let Toby eat those…those…she couldn't even bring herself to think it. Nellie did not try to pretend she was an innocent person. She knew the horrors and atrocities she had committed; there was no getting around them. She had served people pies made of human flesh. She could not escape that. But _why…_oh, God in heaven, _why…_had she let her Toby eat them? She could never tell him the real truth about them. Not now, not ever. She cried and held the boy close to her. No. As badly as she wanted to be honest with him, Toby could never know the whole truth.

"No, darling," she said quietly. "No one else. On'y the Beadle and Judge Turpin, the two devils what took 'is poor wife n' baby from 'im. On'y the two what deserved what they got, n' worse."

Toby's shaking stilled slightly, and together they sat by the fire in silence for what felt like hours. Nellie looked back into the kitchen, and her heart throbbed in sorrow when she saw that Mr. Todd had lowered his head into his arms, resting on the tabletop, his face hidden. She had never seen him like that in all the time she had known him, and she wondered if it was possible that he was concealing his tears…real tears, shed by Sweeney and not Barker.

"Mum," Toby said quietly, after what felt like an eternity of silence. "Is that what 'appened to the pie shop? The law came, looking for the judge?"

Nellie nodded and stroked the boy's hair, sniffling. "Yes, dear. They're trying to get our Mr. Todd for the murders, and they'll be back tomorrow to search the bake house. If they can get us arrested, it'll be the gallows for us both."

Suddenly, with an unimagined burst of energy, Toby broke free of Nellie's arms and sat up on his knees, breathing quickly, his eyes hard.

"No!" he cried defiantly, his fists clenched. "I won't let them! I won't let them do nothin' to 'urt you, not in a million years!"

Nellies eyes filled with fresh tears. "Oh, darlin'…"

"I won't let them, mum! I won't let them 'urt you!"

"No," a deep voice suddenly rumbled close behind them. Both Nellie and Toby jerked around, and Nellie's lips parted in surprise to see Mr. Todd standing in the doorway between the parlor and the pie shop. His dark eyes were sharply narrowed, his face set in stone-hard determination and his arms hung resolutely at his sides.

"Mr. Todd," Toby uttered quietly. There was something strange in his voice, something it took Nellie a moment to place. He wasn't quite afraid…no, it almost sounded something like…respect.

"No," Mr. Todd repeated, walking calmly into the room and standing over them. "We're not going to let them hurt her, lad. Not our Mrs. Lovett."

Nellie's jaw dropped. She stared up at the man incredulously, her eyes wide and dumbfounded. She tried to speak, but could find no words.

"No we won't," Toby replied, his voice growing stronger and firmer. "We'll keep 'er safe, won't we, sir? We won't let anythin' 'appen to 'er!"

The dark scowl of resolution never left Mr. Todd's face, but he nodded once. "Yes, Toby. We'll keep her safe."

Nellie was speechless. Slowly, she and Toby stood up, but even then she continued to stare at Mr. Todd in shocked silence. For perhaps the first time in her entire life, Nellie could not think of a single thing to say.

"The Beadle will be back first thing in the morning," Mr. Todd was saying. He turned and began pacing before the fire, and Toby watched him, listening eagerly. "And it doesn't matter if he finds any evidence or not. He'll find some way to have us hanged. He'll stop at nothing."

"What are we goin' to do?" Toby asked.

Mr. Todd didn't answer, but kept his down as he paced back and forth, deep in thought. After a long moment, he stopped, and looked up.

"We must leave," he said quietly, firmly. "We have no choice. We must leave Fleet Street."

A heavy silence hung in the air for a moment. Toby held his chin in his hand, thinking.

"But Mr. Todd," he said cautiously. "Won't they track us down? If the Beadle's got the police on 'is side, they'll be able to find us anywhere in the city."

"We'll leave the city," Mr. Todd answered. "We'll go someplace far away, where they won't think to look. We're going to disappear."

A thought suddenly struck in Nellie's mind, like a match being lit in the darkness, and she broke out of her stunned reverie and turned to look at Toby and Mr. Todd.

"We'll burn it," she said.

The man and the boy looked up at her. Nellie stared between them, her eyes lost somewhere far away. Her mind was working like mad.

"The pie shop. We'll burn it to the ground, and escape in the night," she went on. "By the time they get it put out, everythin'll be in ashes. Ain't no one could survive a thing like that. They'll think we were all killed in the fire. They won't come lookin' for us then."

A small light suddenly flashed in Mr. Todd's eyes, and she watched as a rare smile spread across his face. She felt frozen, like a statue, as she watched him walk towards her, his smile never fading. He reached out and hooked his hand beneath her chin, lifting her face to his. Her heart pounded in her chest and she held her breath as he leaned close to her; at the last moment, he turned and put his mouth to her ear, whispering softly.

"My pet," he said, as shivers ran down her back, "You are indeed a bloody wonder."


	8. Chapter 8

_Chapter 8_

_Goodbye, Albert_

or

_A Gin-Soaked Rag_

It was midnight exactly. Nellie knew this because the little clock in the parlor was striking twelve chimes as she hurried through the doorway, her arms laden with a towering pile of clothes. They were Mr. Todd's shirts.

_A wonder, really, _she couldn't help thinking as she exhaled in relief and tipped the pile on top of an already stuffed suitcase. _How clean I kept them looking. You'd never know how many times each of 'em have been painted redder than a strawberry._

The parlor was a chaotic mess of bags and papers and shoes and clothes and scattered odds and ends from all around the house. Toby was sitting on the floor, rapidly folding his clothes into odd-shaped little squares and stuffing them in his carpet bag. Nellie was running back and forth between all rooms of the house, grabbing this and that and dropping this and seizing that. She was fighting to keep her nerves from defraying any further than they already were. Time seemed to be moving faster and slower all at once. It was an eternity ago that they had begun this hasty, frenzied packing spree, but only mere seconds ago that the fateful words had escaped her lips.

_We'll burn it. The pie shop. We'll burn it to the ground._

Even as she worked, Nellie's brows knit and her lips parted. Had she really said that? How could she have? This was her home. She had lived here for almost fifteen years. She had married her old Albert in this house. She had become a widow in this house. In this house, she had found her Toby, the little light of her life, and she had seen the return of Mr. Todd…the other, somewhat more…rosy…light of her life.

Thinking of Mr. Todd made Nellie glance over her shoulder to where he was sitting at the desk, a kerosene lamp burning beside him. His back was arched, his head hung low as he furiously scanned and skimmed and rifled through papers, scribbling here, dashing there, crossing out here. He was forging documents for them, giving them new names and new identities. Nellie exhaled again and turned back to the suit case. She somehow managed to cram every one of Mr. Todd's white shirts into one case, but she had to sit on it--hard--to make it close.

_I have to be strong, _she thought. _I can't fail him now. There's no going back. It's us, or the house. _She stood up straight and breathed firmly through her nose.

_Be practical. You're a practical woman. It's just a house, just a creaky old pile a' bricks in a dirty old street in a filthy old city. _

_You can do this._

"Toby, darlin', you'll never get it all in just stuffin' away like that," she muttered, stepping over to him and helping him arrange the clothes in his bag.

"Thanks, mum," Toby whispered. His voice was hollow and shaky.

Nellie looked at him, her lips pursing. She ruffled his hair gently.

"Don't you worry, love. It'll be alright. Mr. T's goin' to take good care of us."

"Finished," Sweeney Todd's voice appeared for the first time in hours. He stood up from the desk, his vest-covered back and slender shoulders silhouetted with golden lamplight. The light played in his wild curly hair and illuminated it with what almost looked like a halo.

"Everythin' in order, love?" Nellie breathed eagerly, hurrying to look over his shoulder.

Mr. Todd answered by shutting the accounts book with a cold, abrupt THUD. Nellie jumped, narrowing her eyes at him and touching her heart.

"Good," she muttered, turning back to the bags laying on the chaise. "Alright then…jus' like we planned. On'y the essentials. Clothes, money, few odds and ends 'ere, papers, shoes…Toby, you did put in your new shoes? Good boy. Coats, purses…that's all. Nothin' that'll be missed when they're goin' through the ashes. Nothin' that shoulda been 'ere and wasn't."

Mr. Todd grunted softly in approval. Then, for a moment, they found themselves standing still. It felt as though the three of them had been moving to and fro nonstop for hours preparing everything they would need to execute their escape plan. Now, at last, everything was ready, and for one short moment, it was as if they both stopped to breathe and comprehend the true scope of what they were about to undertake. Nellie's heart began to pound when she realized she and Mr. Todd were looking at each other. Their eyes had met without any thought of provocation. What was even more incredible than that; when Mr. Todd saw that she was looking at him, and he at her, he didn't turn away. His white face was set into the same dark, determined scowl he always wore…even deeper and darker with determination than normal…but there was something in his eyes, something lingering in the black orbs that spoke to her. Nellie's lips parted and her breath quickened as she stared, trying to hear what it was those dark, beautiful, miserable eyes were trying to say to her.

_Everything is going to change._

Then, like a jolt of electricity, they moved, parting from the moment as if it nothing had happened. Nellie bit her lip and set her nerve like a blacksmith sets his works into iron. She had to be strong. This had to be done. They had no choice. There was no going back.

Between the three of them, they had managed to condense everything they were taking with them into four large bags. They piled on every scrap of winter clothing they owned; coats, overcoats, scarves, gloves, boots, more scarves, everything. Nellie worked and worked at Toby's collar until he was so bundled up with wool and knitted things that not the tiniest draft of the frigid winter night could find its way through to his skin. Then, they went through and extinguished every light in the house, except for the small fire still crackling in the hearth and the little lamp that Mr. Todd had used on the desk.

"'Ere Toby," Nellie said, her breath short with a combination of weariness, anxiety, and what felt like a burning, mounting sense of what she dared to call excitement. "You go now, and take all the bags, and wait outside for us. You stay right close to the shop now, understand? You don' go _nowhere _else. And if you see someone comin'…_any_one comin', what looks like they might be with the law or the Beadle or anythin', you jump inside straightaway and tell us. Understand?"

Toby nodded, or did the best job he could of nodding, what with his neck virtually immobilized with layers of winter clothing.

"I understand mum."

Despite the obvious fear in his voice, there was something else as well; a spark, a light, a defiant little piece of bravery that he was determined to hold onto. Nellie felt her chest catching, and a broken smile appeared on her face, but she knew that letting herself break into tears at this moment was simply not an option. She swallowed them back and sniffed, leaning over and kissing Toby quickly on the forehead.

"We'll be alright darlin'. I promise."

Toby forced a courageous smile, then went and worked his way through the side door of the pie shop, dragging the bags one by one behind him. Nellie turned and looked around her at the suddenly empty room.

"Mr. T?" she called, walking swiftly back into the parlor and looking left and right. Where had he gone?

"Here," she heard his deep voice bark harshly from somewhere far away. She followed the sound and hurried down the steps into the bake house, her heeled boots clunking unceremoniously on the wooden steps. It was difficult to move in her thick woolen coat and cape, and the added warmth was beginning to make a light perspiration bead on her neck and temples.

"Mr. T?"

He was there, standing in front of the great iron behemoth that was the bake house stove. He was bent over, working. Nellie came up to stand behind him and watch. They had outlined this plan together already, but there was something about just watching the man she loved putting it into action that captivated her.

Mr. Todd breathed heavily and grunted with effort as he worked. All around the tall iron belly of the oven, for five feet in every direction, there was wood. Enormous, ringed piles of wood. Every scrap of tinder and kindling they could find, as well as a few pieces of furniture from upstairs, had been sacrificed to create the strange-looking altar. Beside the giant heap of wood, on the cobbled bake house floor, sat four large tins with pouring nozzles.

"Out of the way," Mr. Todd snarled. Nellie obediently stepped back, but continued to watch in fascination.

One by one, Mr. Todd pulled the corks from the cans and walked around the wood pile in slow circles, pouring the clear, noxious smelling liquid over everything. The invisible stinging vapor hit Nellie in the face and made her eyes water. She blinked and coughed, holding her hand over her nose. Mr. Todd continued until each can of kerosene had been emptied and the whole bake house was a volatile powder keg just waiting to be ignited.

Finally, Mr. Todd took one last little can with a small pouring spout, and walked towards Nellie and the door, leaving behind him a small, careful trail of kerosene that lead straight to the oven and the mass of potential hellfire encircled around it.

"Go," he ordered her. Nellie turned to make her way back up the staircase, but before she did, she found herself pausing to look over her shoulder one last time. The bake house was dark, the stove unlit, the only light being the pale yellow beam that streamed in through the open door, and even that was marred by the shadows of the two figures standing in the doorway. But even though it was dark, and empty, and reeking of explosive fumes and the imminent disaster to come…something held Nellie there. This place had been her temple. It was here, every day for months on end, that she came to pay worship to the god of her affections; to slave and toil in horrible bloody sacrifices in order to appease the man she loved, the man who had her heart on a string. She didn't know if she was pausing because she would miss the bake house, or because she had come to despise it with every fiber of her being.

Suddenly, out from the darkness came a hand gloved in black leather. She jumped as it came down and landed on her shoulder, holding her. She looked into Mr. Todd's shadowed face with a look of complete shock.

"Mr….Mr. T…." she stammered quietly. It was nothing, really. Just a hand on the shoulder. But it was the first time, in as long as she had known him, that he had given her a touch like that. He was not playing with her, lifting her chin or dancing with her in a kitchen, mocking her and toying heartless with her unrequited love. No, this was different. He was touching her, really touching her. For a split second, her mind went back to what felt like an ancient memory; a grey day, with pale sunlight streaming through the windows, when she had offered him something…offered him everything she had…

_We could have a life, you and I. Maybe not like I dreamed. Maybe not like you remembered. But we could get by._

He had looked at her when she said that. Looked at her in a way she had never seen before. He had seen her. He had turned to her with those black eyes, those eyes always searching, always sorrowful, always furious, always empty…and she had seen something.

His eyes that day, and his hand tonight, in the hot, Stygian, chemical darkness…they were one and the same. She thought…she dared to believe…there was comfort meant for her in that touch.

"Mrs. Lovett," he said, his voice toneless and commanding. "Move."

She looked at him an instant longer, then nodded, her lips firmly set in a thin line. She turned and went up the staircase, forcing herself to keep her head high and her eyes set straight ahead. She didn't turn around as she heard Mr. Todd following her, the splashing trickle of the kerosene trailing after them. By the time they reached the top, the wooden steps were as laden with ignitability as the bake house.

Nellie did not stop to look at her kitchen. She did not go in to pay a final farewell to the parlor or the bedroom or her rug by the fireplace. She did not stop. She did not allow herself to feel. The one thing she did was to reach out with one hand as she passed by the far wall in the kitchen…reach out with one hand and take a single item down from the wall and clutch it to her chest as she walked out. She stepped into the black, frozen night, and the silent, unbidden tears budding in the corners of her eyes stung with coldness. Toby was waiting for her, the huge, overstuffed bags and suitcases sitting around him in the snow, looking for all the world like big brown dogs asleep at his feet.

"Where's Mr. Todd?"

""E'll be along. Come, move across the street."

She and Toby shuffled the bags along with them and crossed to the walk on the other side of the road. Not a single soul was out and about; the streetlamps cast yellow pools of light on the mud and snow covered cobblestones, and above them the night sky was starless and black. Their breath puffed around them in tangible white clouds as they stood together, huddle on the sidewalk and staring across the street at the building that had been their home and their livelihood. Nellie silent mouthed the words painted in gold letter above the door post; _Mrs. Lovett's Meat Pies._

_Not anymore._

"What's that, mum?" Toby asked quietly.

Nellie looked at him, and slowly moved the flat, cold object away from her chest. It was a framed photograph, the picture of her first husband, Albert.

Toby's eyes grew soft. "Mum," he whispered. "You shouldn' bring that."

Nellie squeezed her eyes shut. Toby was right. If it the old photograph was ever found with them, it could be used to identify them. The cold tears stung harder in her eyes, but she refused to let them fall.

"I know, love. I'm not takin' it. I just…'ad to 'old it for a bit. Just for a bit."

A faint snow began to fall, delicate and silent. A moment later, the dark, coated figure of Mr. Todd appeared in the front doorway of the pie shop. His white skin, and the white streak of his hair seemed to glow in the lamplight. He met eyes with Nellie and Toby for only a second, then he stepped outside, closing the door of the shop behind them. The faint tingling of the bells seemed to echo through the empty canyons of the London night. Nellie closed her eyes and breathed deep.

"Wait," she called, hissing in a loud whisper. Mr. Todd turned around and watched her hurry back across the street.

"What?" he whispered fiercely. Nellie held his gaze, then slowly handed him the photograph. Mr. Todd took it without looking at it. Instead, his eyes were fixed on hers.

"Put it inside," she breathed, then turned and went back to Toby. As she walked, she closed her eyes and told herself to be practical.

_Goodbye Albert. Goodbye forever._

The moment had come. There was nothing more to be done, nothing more to be delayed. The moment had come.

Nellie took Toby in her arms and hugged him against her, watching with wide, unblinking eyes as Mr. Todd took something from the inside of his coat; it was a bottle, a bottle half full of gin. A rag was stuffed into the skinny mouth, half of it exposed and hanging like a white flag of surrender.

_Not a surrender, _Nellie told herself, holding Toby closer. _We're not giving up. We're going to fight._

Mr. Todd lit a match. The sulfur burned and flared a brilliant blue, then orange. The sound of it seemed impossibly loud. He held the brief, flickering flame to the tip of the rag, and it caught ablaze, burning slowly. Reaching out, Sweeney gently, carefully, rolled the bottle into the open front door of the shop. He then took the photograph Nellie had handed him and set it down inside. He closed the door. He locked it.

Calmly, Mr. Todd turned and walked across the street. His face was set, firm, unblinking.

"Go," he said the instant he was within earshot of Nellie and Toby.

"What? But Mr…."

"GO!" he snarled, reaching down and seizing two of the bags. Nellie and Toby quickly each took one apiece and hurried off behind him, struggling to keep up with his pace. The three of them walked down Fleet Street together, carrying everything they now owned in the world on their backs. Mrs. Lovett's Pie Shop…Sweeney Todd's Tonsorial Parlor…their home…had soon shrunk away into the distance behind them. Then they rounded a corner, and it disappeared forever, as easily as if it had never existed.

Twenty seconds later, it came. The explosion. They were one block away when the sound wave hit them, and all three of them jumped and spun around. An orange glow was rising up over the roofs of the houses and shops, and sharp crackling noises and more explosions, the snapping of wood fixtures and the breaking of glass windows and the fire from within burst them apart. Clouds of smoke blacker than the night sky began billowing up in great mushroom shapes, floating high above the city in a wafting tower, the tower of the inferno that had once been their poor little pie shop. They could not see any part of the fire. But they knew that the blaze had been set. In a few hours, nothing would remain of the building but a heap of rubble and ashes.

They continued on. They didn't stop again, not even to glance back at the ever-increasing towers of smoke that filled the entire neighborhood with its crisp, searing stench. They walked side by side, Toby half-jogging to keep up on his skinny little legs, and Nellie walking very briskly and breathing thickly. Sweeney Todd neither looked at them nor spoke to them. He carried one bag over his shoulder and the other beneath his arm, and he gazed straight ahead with a blank, expressionless stare as they made their way through the night. After almost an hour of silence and restless journeying, they had come nearly to the edge of the city. The river loomed dreary and frozen beside them, the ships all anchored and locked into the docks, hibernating for the winter. They finally came to a stop on the walk beside the water. They dropped their bags, bent over, and panted for breath. Even Mr. Todd leaned against the sea wall and opened his mouth, breathing heavily. After a few moments, Nellie suddenly looked up at him.

"Mr. Todd," she said quietly. He didn't respond.

"Mr. Todd."

He lowered his head further, looking down at the ground.

"Love," she whispered.

Slowly, blankly, he looked up at her.

"What," he said, without even the slightest trace of any recognizable human emotion.

The tears that had been threatening to fall all night finally could not bear to be pent up any longer. They streamed in thin, clear streaks from Nellie's eyes as she looked up into the pale empty face of the barber with whom she had run away from everything…with whom she had given up everything.

"I'm sorry," she said.

He looked at her, unmoving. "Why."

In spite of her tears, she smiled faintly. "It was your 'ome before it was mine."

There was no change in Sweeney's face. He did not smile, or frown, and his eyes did not change. He only watched her in complete silence. But she could hear him. Even if he didn't say the words, even if he never said the words, as long as they lived…she could hear him.

_Thank you._

Without a word, Sweeney bent down and heaved the suitcases back up again.

"We have to be clear of London before the sun is up," he said firmly. "Keep moving."

Sniffling, watching him turn away, Nellie quickly dried her tears and lifted her bag, taking Toby's gloved hand in hers.

"Come along, love."

"Right, mum."

It was done. They had left all of it behind them. It was just as Mr. Todd had said to her, said to her without any words.

_Everything is going to change._

They disappeared together, into the darkness.

A/N; This is not the end of the story. There's a lot more to come. Hopefully I'll be able to update again soonJ


	9. Chapter 9

_A/N; Chapter 9! Woot! And thank you so much to everyone who reviewed me __J_

_Chapter 9_

_You n' Me, Mr. T_

or

_The Life I Covet_

"Mr. T."

Silence.

"Mr. T."

Silence. _Ignore her._

"Mr. _T."_

_Just ignore her. Ignore her and maybe she'll shut up._

"_Mr. Todd."_

Sweeney let a long, resigned exhale stream from the back of his throat. He closed his eyes briefly.

"What," he growled lowly, his voice soft and weary. They had been walking for nearly five hours. The cobbled streets, smoking rooftops, and clattering hansoms of the city had long since vanished behind them, replaced by wet country roads a foot deep with mire and wide, white stretches of snow-covered fields. There was absolutely no light; no moon, no stars, nothing. The only thing that kept them from being completely submerged in darkness and going on the right road was the small lamp Sweeney held stretched out in front of them, and even with it they found themselves wandering off the path every now and then and had to right themselves quickly before they lost it altogether.

Mrs. Lovett tilted her head towards Toby, who was walking on her right.

"We got a problem, love."

Sweeney reluctantly turned to look and saw that the boy was practically nodding off on his feet. He was stumbling along beside Mrs. Lovett like a sleepwalker, the heavy bag just barely clutched in his arms and his eyes blinking groggily. Sweeney narrowed his eyes and looked back at the road. He said nothing. As if he could be bothered with that at a time like this…

"We been runnin' for '_ours_, Mr. T, the boy's got to take a rest sometime."

"No," Sweeney said firmly, too tired to make himself sound angry.

"'E can't keep up like this all night!"

"He has to," Sweeney replied, in the same _we-are-not-discussing-this _kind of tone.

"Oh, come now, Mr. T," Mrs. Lovett said quietly. Sweeney's face knit in irritation as he glanced at her. He knew it. Whenever she grew that throaty, motherly, _lets-be-reasonable _stint to her voice, he was in for a compromise. She was making the face she always did when she spoke to him like that; her chin tilted down, looking up at him from beneath the top of her eyelids, her full mouth closed firmly and her eyebrows raised expectantly.

"Be sensible, love," she continued. "You can't expect a little thing like 'im to keep up with us for so long, carryin' that great thing on 'is back! Brute weighs nearly as much as 'e does. I'm nearly wore down to the bone, meself. An' you, love, you must be closer to droppin' than either of us!"

Sweeney refused to betray any sign of it in his face or his countenance, but the truth was Mrs. Lovett was right. His muscles ached and burned from the strain of the two enormous bags, his back already feeling as if it were kinking. He had to admit it, if only to himself; he was exhausted. For a moment, he was transported back to his hot, hellish memories of Australia; the prison walls, the forced labor, the merciless sun beating down on his back, searing him alive; and the weight, the ungodly weight of the rocks and the tools, the blisters on his hands, the unending, tearing stretch of his arms and legs…

"Mr. Todd."

Her voice snapped him from his reverie. He looked back at the boy. His eyes were fully closed now, his head hanging down and his steps slowing by the second. Sweeney exhaled again, then, almost with great effort, he stopped. The moment he ceased walked, the true toll on his body made itself known; his limbs cried out and his joints felt like they were on fire. Sweeney had never given it much thought or care before, but now the realization seemed to creep up on him in one swoop; he was beginning to grow old.

Sweeney looked at the boy, then the woman. Suddenly, something about the image of the two of them standing there together chilled him. Why was it that the sight unsettled him so much? He didn't know, and he was too tired to care. He narrowed his eyes and turned his face away from them.

"We'll find somewhere to rest until daybreak."

He didn't see Mrs. Lovett smile, but he could feel it. If he'd had the energy, he would have rolled his eyes in a scowl.

_Damn woman…she and that skinny whelp of hers…won't be satisfied until we're all hanging from the gallows._

"It's the right thing, love, you'll see," he suddenly felt Mrs. Lovett's hand patting gently on his back. He stood like a statue and ignored it. "We'll all feel right as rain after a few 'ours sleep."

They stood there in the road for a few awkward minutes. Sweeney tilted his eyes toward Mrs. Lovett and forced himself to speak to her. Someone had to point out the obvious.

"And where do you suggest we sleep?"

Mrs. Lovett looked as though she were about to open her mouth, but then she closed it firmly and touched her gloved hand to her chin.

"Well," she muttered, brows furrowing in thought. "That is a bit of a problem, ain't it?"

Sweeney sighed, hoisting the bags up again. This time, he couldn't keep himself from uttering an audible cry of pain as the joints and muscles in his shoulders immediately seized up.

"Mr. T! Put those down 'fore you--"

"Keep moving!" Sweeney growled, cutting her off. "You want the boy to sleep? Then we have to find a shelter."

"But--"

"Let's go," he snapped firmly.

Sweeney Todd hoisted the crushing weight of the bags higher onto his shoulders and grit his teeth rather than let himself make another sound. He lifted the lantern higher and took a few forceful steps further. His feet sank in the snow and slush almost over the tops of his boots. He craned his neck back and saw that Mrs. Lovett and the boy…who was by now not even cognizant of anything that was happening…hadn't moved. Unbidden, a searing flash of anger burned into him. All night, he had been holding everything in…all his emotions, his rage, his hatred, his screaming, agonizing misery at being forced to leave the only place he'd ever truly recognized as his home…the only place where he could still feel even a remote attachment to his beloved Lucy, his darling Johanna…he'd held everything in. He hadn't even let himself look back. And now, suddenly, he realized that he had done it for them, the boy and the bitch. It came to him like a smack in the face, the truth…_he had done it for them. _If he had been alone, if Mrs. Lovett and Toby hadn't been counting on him, he wouldn't have lifted a finger to save himself. He would have let the Beadle throw any charge he wished…he wouldn't have said a word. He'd have let himself be led to the gallows like an obedient dog. But he hadn't; he'd fought, he'd destroyed his own home and with it all the tangible memories of his old life, just to save the two of them. And now, seeing them standing there almost knee-deep in the mire, just staring at him like that…

It was too much. A woman. A woman, and a child…her child, her boy, her own…

And they were depending on him.

All at once Sweeney's rage vanished, vanished because it was abruptly replaced by something far greater and far more horrible.

They were counting on him. _He had done it for them._

He knew why he hadn't been able to stomach the sight of them standing together. It was because they were a mother and a child.

And he had become a father again.

The bags fell off his shoulders and landed with heavy, thudding splashes in the wet mess of the country road. The lantern slipped from his grasp and crashed in the snow, extinguishing almost instantly in a crackle of steaming smoke. Everything became black. Sweeney didn't feel himself falling until his side hit the ground, and he winced as Mrs. Lovett's piercing shriek bit through the air. It was the last thing he heard.

_Damn woman…can't be quiet to save her life. _

Then all thought ceased; his eyes rolled in his head, and everything…the cold and the wet and the black and the horrific realization that he had once again become what he swore he would never be again…everything…faded into nothingness.

"Sweeney! _No!"_

_No no no no no no no! No!_

Nellie let go of Toby's hand and threw herself forward, but it was too late. The last thing she saw before the lantern went out was Mr. Todd crumpling, his body half-fallen to the ground. Everything slipped into blackness, and she heard rather than saw him hit the ground. Her scream broke Toby from his waking sleep; she heard him stir and drop the bag.

"Mum?" he called, wide awake, but his voice hoarse. "Mum! What's 'appening?"

Nellie barely heard him. She was sucking in huge, panic breaths, and her eyes were wide open, but she could see nothing. Ignoring the freezing slush and deep mud soaking through her arms and legs, she dropped to her knees and reached out frantically from Mr. Todd. Her hand found his side in the darkness, and she pulled herself towards him and felt in surreal, blind panic until she found his face.

"Mr. Todd?? Mr. Todd! Sweeney! Wake up!"

She heart a muffled sound behind her; Toby had tripped. "Mum!" he called again. "Where are you??"

"Stay there!" she cried hoarsely. "Jus' stay there, Toby!"

_No, no, no no no…_

"Mr. T. Mr. T. Please, please wake up…Mr. T!" she said his name over and over, pulling her wet glove off with her teeth so she could cup his face with her hand. She couldn't see her own nose in the swallowing completeness of the country darkness. Her heart pounded, fear threatening to seize hold of her.

_No! Stay calm. Just stay calm._

"Mr. Todd. Mr. Todd. _Sweeney."_

He wasn't moving. Oh, if only she could see him! Carefully, she bent over and put her ear over what she thought was his mouth. She squeezed her eyes shut and held her breath. There…there…it was faint, but it was there….the sound of his breath. Nellie almost cried out in relief. He was alright. He was unconscious…fainted, or blacked out…but he was alright.

Nellie looked up and turned her head around in every direction, and she discovered that she could suddenly make out a very faint, blue-white color all around her. Everything was still almost entirely dark, but slowly, every so slowly, her eyes were adjusting. She could now see the difference between the snow and the air.

"Toby!" she called out. He moved somewhere nearby.

"What it is? What's 'appened?"

"It's Mr. Todd. 'E's fainted."

"What??"

"I don't know, love. I don't know. We mustn't panic. Jus' stay calm, Toby, stay calm. We've got to get him out of the cold some'ow."

"Where?" Toby asked desperately, breathing heavily. "I can't see nothin' at all! There might not be a house for miles!"

"Sh! Stay _calm! _It'll be alright! It'll be alright…" Nellie's voice began to trail off. Fear, like a vice, clamped tight around her heart and almost held her motionless. To make matters worse, all around the wind suddenly began to pick up, rushing past them in unbearable icy gusts. It whistled and tore and soon became an almost deafening blast.

Nellie began running her fingers through Mr. Todd's hair, her breath quickening and her heart pounding.

_You can't lose your head. You can _not _lose your head._

"Don't lose your 'ead…" she muttered to herself, stroking faster and faster and beginning to rock slightly back and forth. "Don't lose your 'ead…"

"Mum…" Toby's voice came to her, muffled and weak through the howling wind. "Mum…I'm s-so….so…c-cold…"

"Toby! Toby! No, no, stay with me, love! Stay with me!" she squinted furiously in his direction, but it was still too dark for her to make out exactly where he was.

"Mum…" he whispered, his voice failing, "…help me."

It was like a bolt of lightning. It was like someone had built, in miniature, a model effigy of the fire they had used to destroy the pie shop deep in the bottom of Nellie's stomach, and those two small words were the match that lit it.

She stopped rocking. She closed her mouth and set her jaw, her teeth clenching firmly. She had to be strong. These two…Toby, and Mr. Todd…they were all she had now. She was not going to let this happen.

First things first. She had to find the lantern. She sifted through the snow and mud with her hands for almost four minutes before she finally felt it; the frigid, smooth surface of the glass. Mercifully, the glass hadn't broken when Mr. Todd had dropped it, and there was still enough fuel left to keep a flame burning for at least an hour…but getting it lit again was going to be another matter. It would be literally impossible for her to find a match in one of their bags; she knew she had packed some, but she had no idea where or in which suitcase, and doing it blind would only make things doubly as undoable. Then, she suddenly remembered, and crowed with joy as she quickly but gently turned Mr. Todd onto his back and felt for the buttons of his overcoat. She undid four of them, slid her hand between the wool and his covered chest, and carefully felt the lining until she found it; the book of matches he'd used to light the bottle of gin.

The wind had picked up even further and was howling like a banshee all around her, but by turning her back to his and bending over far enough, she was just able to keep a match lit long enough to start the kerosene. She nearly cried with relief when the bright orange glow of the lantern burst into life, and she squinted as the vision seared back into her eyes. The first thing she saw was Mr. Todd; his eyes were closed and his lips were parted, and although she knew it was because he was unconscious, she couldn't help but think, fleetingly, that his face looked calmer and more serene than she had ever seen it.

Nellie wanted nothing more than to reach out and take the barber in her arms, but she knew she couldn't; she had to attend to Toby first. Reluctantly, she turned away and crawled a few yards over to where the boy sat in the snow; he had curled himself into a ball, hugging his knees and trembling so violently it was visible. Nellie set the lantern down beside him and seized him, pulling him close to her and rubbing her arms up and down his body, forcing warmth back into him.

"M…mum…" he whispered, his teeth chattering.

Nellie smiled, a real, honest smile of relief. "There's my brave boy. Listen to me, Toby. I need your 'elp. We've got to move Mr. Todd, and I can't do it alone. You've got to be strong, Toby. You've got to 'elp me."

Slowly, frailly, Toby nodded. Nellie took the scarf from her neck and hastily tucked it over his face, wrapping it around to cover his mouth and nose and ears.

"Alright, Toby. Up you get."

The two of them staggered to their feet and picked their way through the mire to where Mr. Todd lay, unmoved from the place where he'd fallen.

"Alright now…'ere's what we'll do…Toby, you get round on his right there, an' I'll go on this side. On three, we've got to try and stand 'im up."

"But where will we take 'im?"

Nellie pursed his lips. _Don't lose your head!_

"I don' know, Toby. But we can't leave 'im 'ere. It'll be a bloody miracle if 'e ain't got frostbite already, 'im _and _you. Alright now, under 'is arm, right like that…good boy, that's the way. Alright, one three…one…two…_three!"_

Nellie and Toby both groaned and heaved with effort as they pulled up on the barber's arms with all their strength. Sweeney Todd was not an especially large man, nor was he particularly heavy; in fact, his frame was thinner than most, and his muscles were lean and ropy; but between the snow, and the wind, and the utter exhaustion of his two rescuers, and the added weight of nearly his entire winter wardrobe, he was excruciatingly difficult to lift. Nellie grit her teeth and pushed with all her might…she was terrified of letting him fall, lest he twist the wrong way and strike his head, or injure himself in some way…she forced herself to keep holding on, even though her body was screaming and her knees were threatening to buckle. Finally, with one last growl of effort, she and Toby managed to right themselves, standing up nearly straight with Mr. Todd slung limply between them, one of his arms draped around either of their necks. They were breathing hard, and the wind was howling more fiercely than ever, but they held their ground.

"Brilliant, Toby!" Nellie cried between breaths. "There's my big strong boy!"

"Now what, Mum?" he asked, panting heavily.

Narrowing her eyes, Nellie turned her head and scanned the black horizon all around them. It was almost impossible to distinguish the distant line of trees from the ground, but if she squinted exactly right and turned with her back to the lantern light…

"There!" she shouted triumphantly. It was dim, and vague, and she had no way of knowing how far off it was…but it was there. A dark, looming shape, blacker than the trees and marked on the pale snow.

"A house!" Toby cried.

Nellie's mind was working rapidly, the gears and pistons churning and hammering in her head.

"Listen carefully, Toby. We've got to take the lantern with us. I'll 'old it in my teeth. We're goin' to 'ave to carry Mr. Todd to the 'ouse, but we 'ave to be _very, very careful. _We 'ave to count 'ow many steps we take, and once we're there we 'ave to remember _exactly _what direction we came from. One we're there, you'll 'ave to take him inside while I come back for the bags."

Toby opened his mouth immediately to protest, but Nellie cut him off. "No arguments, now!" she barked sharply.

"But Mum, let _me_ come back for them, you shouldn' be…"

"Hush! No more talk now, love. You're goin' to 'ave to do the counting. Count aloud, Toby, nice n' loud now so we don' lose track!"

Toby looked at her as if he wanted to argue, but he didn't. Together, moving carefully to keep the unconscious man on their shoulders from slipping off, they took their first step forward.

"One!"

The wind shrieked and whipped at their hair and clothes. The deep snow crunched under their feet. Nellie took the lantern and placed the skinny iron handle between her teeth, careful to rub it first with her glove so her tongue wouldn't freeze to the metal. The weight of the lantern hung heavy and pulled at her jaw, but she was too determined to let it fall. Once it was in place, she quickly seized Mr. Todd's arm again and hoisted him higher over her shoulders.

"Two!" Toby counted. At a snail's pace, the dark shape of the house in the distance began to draw closer.

"Seven! Eight! Nine!"

_That a boy, Toby._

Nellie turned her eyes far to her right to check on Mr. Todd. His neck was limp, his head lolling down and to the left, so that his face rested only a few inches from hers. His expression was still set in the blank, sleeping stillness of unconsciousness. In spite of everything, the cold, the wind, the freezing chill of the snow soaking through their clothes, the yanking, grinding weight of the lantern against her teeth, and the horrible disaster which had marked the outset of their escape…in spite of it all…Nellie felt a warmth, like an unseen smile, beginning to glow deep in her chest.

_Well, _she thought, looking into Mr. Todd's quiet face as Toby's voice called out numbers that slipped away in the wind, reaching her ears as only faint, distant words…_I suppose it's my own bloody fault. _

_It's you n' me, Mr. T._

_That's the life I covet. The life I've chosen._

"Eighteen! Nineteen! Twenty!"

The invisible smile burned brighter.

_My boys…_

…_that's the life I've chosen._


	10. Chapter 10

_A/N; Chapter 10! Woot. I think I'm going to try and see if I can keep uploading a new chapter every day. It's like a fan fiction marathon…fresh thanks to everyone who reviewed me! You're all lovely. A special nod to DojoGhost…your chapter 9 comment literally made me laugh out loud ( smiles )._

_Refreshed disclaimer; I don't own Sweeney Todd and I'm not getting paid to write about it _

_Chapter 10_

_My Lucy Lies in Ashes!_

or

_Room Only For One_

"Sweetheart," she whispered.

"Mmmmm," he hummed softly.

"Sweetheart."

"Mmm…"

She leaned over and delicately kissed his temple. He stirred further, rolling onto his back and turning his head in her direction. He blinked his eyes open and gave her a tired smile. She returned it and kissed him again.

"Darling, wake up."

"I am awake," he replied softly with a yawn. "What is it?"

"It's Johanna. She's up again."

He sighed, rubbing his eyes with his fingers. "Again?"

"Yes. It's your turn, darling."

In spite of his weariness, he smiled. "You're very good at remembering."

Lucy chuckled quietly. "You have to practice at it now or you'll never learn. Now, go, darling, I can hear her crying."

Reluctantly, he turned and got out of the warm bed, groggily stepping into a dressing gown and slippers. Johanna's room was next to theirs, the doors between them always left open so they could be alerted immediately to the sounds of her crying.

"First thing tomorrow," he joked quietly as he left the room. "…I'm finding a nanny."

He could almost hear the sound of Lucy smiling in the semi-darkness.

"Don't be silly, Ben. You're the best nanny there is."

Benjamin Barker yawned again as he entered his daughter's bedroom. The shrill sounds of her mild wailing intensified the nearer he came to the crib.

"Oh, where's daddy's little girl? Where's my little dove?" he began to coo as he came closer. "Where's my Johanna?"

He looked over the side of the crib.

He did not wake up slowly. His eyelids did not flutter. There was no pause, no calm, no extended moment of suspension between sleeping and awake. He did not wake up slowly. He woke up gasping. He awoke like a person who has their head plunged under ice water.

He gasped. His eyes shot open all the way and he sucked in a breath, his throat rasping and contracting and making him cough. He was flat on his back. His chest heaved with his heavy breathing, his heart banging like a drum and his veins pumping. He seized his chest with his hand, gripping it with his fingers, as if in a vain struggle to hold the throbbing muscle in place.

He was flat on his back, but it was not on the mattress of his bed with his beloved Lucy asleep beside him. He was laying on a wooden floor, fully dressed, with some foreign manner of covering draped over him. His head was propped up on something only partially soft, and his eyes stared up at a ceiling. As he held his heart and gasped for breath, he noticed cracks; thousands of them, running like thin black bolts of lightning every which way through the plaster ceiling. Then he realized the smell; all around him was the pungent, dank odor of mildew, dust, and wet, rotting wood. He turned his head to the right. He was laying in front of an enormous hearth, filthy with years of unkempt soot and ashes; a respectable-looking fire was crackling within it, casting an orange glow over everything in sight. It was the only source of light in the room. He turned his head to the left, and gasped again.

A woman was kneeling a few feet away from him, looking at him. Her eyes were wide and she appeared to be frozen in astonishment. Beside her was a child, a young boy perhaps ten or eleven years old, curled on his side and sleeping beneath piles of coats and blankets.

Benjamin stared at them, heart pounding in his ears, not knowing what to do or say. For a long, long moment, they sat there in silence. Finally, the woman moved; she scooted closer to him, her wide brown eyes watching him in a combination of worry and curiosity. Without knowing why, he instinctively withdrew from her the closer she came.

"Mr. Todd?" she said quietly, her voice low and breathy. He blinked. Who?

"Mr. Todd," she repeated, gently reaching out and smoothing his hair back from his forehead. He shuddered at her touch, swallowing and wetting his lips, his eyes never leaving her. "Mr. T? You there, love?"

He opened his mouth to speak, and found that his voice was weak and hoarse. He nearly trembled as he spoke.

"Who…who are you?"

The woman froze, slowly retracting her hand. The large brown eyes instantly changed to a look of understanding sorrow.

"Shhhh," she whispered softly. "Take it easy, love. Jus' take it slow."

"No…no…this isn't…who are you? Where am I?" he began to sit up.

"No!" the woman said, carefully pushing him back down. "You mustn't move yet!"

"Get off!" he cried, suddenly panicking. He scrambled back from her and pushed himself off the floor, his blanket ( which turned out to be an overcoat ) falling off of him as he sat upright. His view of the room became clearer; the place looked as if it hadn't been lived in for years. There wasn't a stick of furniture to be seen, and the windows were glassless and boarded up. Rags had been stuffed in the large cracks. Nearly an inch of dust lay on the floor, the walls and ceiling were cracking, and cobwebs cluttered the corners.

Benjamin struggled to slow his frenzied breathing, but to no avail. His head was spinning. Worst of all, the strange woman just sat there, staring at him, with that look of inexplicable pity in her eyes.

"Tell me where I am!" he shouted. "Tell me who you are! What am I doing here?? Where's…"

"_Hush!" _she hissed fiercely. "For 'eaven's sake…you want to wake Toby? 'Ush yourself!"

"No. No. You tell me what's going on. Tell me this instant."

"Shhhh! I'll tell ya if you'll _keep your bloody voice down!"_

Benjamin swallowed, his heart still throbbing, struggling to keep himself calm. This couldn't be real. This was a nightmare. Where was Lucy? Where was Johanna? Why wasn't he with them? Where in the world _was _he?

"Please," he whispered, addressing the strange woman in front of him as earnestly as he could. "_Please…_just…_tell _me what's going on."

The woman looked him in the eye a moment, and sighed. She turned her face to the fire and sat beside him, staring at it. She muttered something quietly under her breath, something he couldn't make out.

"Please," he tried again. "Where are they?"

The woman looked at him.

"My wife. My child. Where are they?"

Something stirred in her eyes. For a moment he thought it was the shine of tears, but she cleared her throat and the light vanished.

"They're gone," she said quietly.

It didn't register. Benjamin blinked.

"Where are they?"

"They're gone, love."

It wasn't sinking in. He heard the words, but it was as if they were in a different language. Gone. Gone. What in hell did she mean by _gone?_

"Yes, they're _gone, _but _where?" _he demanded, panic threatening to seize him once again.

The woman lowered her head further, so that her face was hidden from him, and she sighed again.

"Jus' a moment, darlin'."

The term of endearment struck him hard. Who on earth was this woman? He watched as she stood up and went a few feet away to where a pile of enormous carpet bags lay heaped on the floor. She opened the smallest of them and searched around in it for a few moments before taking something out, then returning and sitting beside him in front of the fire again. Benjamin looked at the object in her hands. It was a pocket mirror, a foldable little gold circle. He watched as she opened it and handed it to him, still refusing to look him in the face.

"What is this?" he asked.

"Look in it, love," she answered blankly.

Panicked and confused, but still curious, Benjamin obediently looked down into the little mirror in his palm. What he saw made his eyes widen and his breath hasten until he felt he might faint.

The man looking back at him was a complete stranger. He still had Benjamin's features, yet he was a different person entirely. His skin was so pale that at first glance he thought it was quite literally white--white, like paper. The great sunken circles around his eyes were so dark they nearly looked like the eye sockets of a skeleton. His hair was wild and unkempt, and darker than it should have been, and a white streak had formed itself out of the crown of his head. But by far, the most disturbing thing…the thing that made him narrow his eyes in disbelief and lean closer to the mirror…was the fact that he looked as if he had aged half a lifetime. Deep, tired lines cracked his face into an almost effortless, permanent scowl. As if in response to his realization of this, he suddenly felt a dull, aching pain surge through his entire body, as if his joints and limbs had suddenly aged as well. He stared at the unfamiliar face in the mirror, unable to break his eyes away and unable to speak.

The woman nodded her head once, then reached out and took the mirror from him, breaking the trance. Benjamin blinked and shook himself, his lips still parted in shock and disbelief.

"No," he began to jabber, shaking his head slowly. "No, no no no…no, this isn't…this can't be…"

"Be still, love," the woman cooed, scooted towards him suddenly and laying her hand on his cheek. Benjamin froze momentarily at her touch, then tore away, glaring at her.

"Keep away!" he cried, his voice failing. "Stay away from me!"

The woman looked hurt. He didn't care. He was reeling.

"Listen to me," he said. "Listen to me. You tell me where Lucy is. Tell me right now."

The woman turned away. When she spoke, her voice was toneless, barely audible.

"She's dead."

Outside, the wind howled and screamed and shook the crumbling foundations of the house. The fire crackled cheerily in the hearth. The boy moved in his sleep and resettled, his breathing shallow and regular.

Benjamin stopped breathing.

_What?_

The woman turned her back to him completely. She hunched over and stared at the floor, not moving.

The wind howled.

"What?" Benjamin said. He heard his own voice as if it were coming from somewhere far away.

"Dead. Buried. Gone."

Benjamin shook his head. He didn't believe it. She was lying. This whole place was a lie. This was a nightmare. He would wake up any second and be right back where he belonged, in bed beside Lucy, and their daughter Johanna would be crying again in the next room, waiting for one of them to go in and comfort her yet again.

This was a nightmare. And he was tired of it.

"No," he said firmly, rising to his feet. "You're lying. This is…all of this…this is a lie. I'm leaving."

That got the woman's attention. She jerked her head up, her sullen eyes suddenly wide and alert.

"No!" she cried, standing up herself. "Mr. T, you can't…"

Benjamin spun around, abruptly seized by an unbelievable anger. "_Why _do you keep _calling me that?" _he demanded furiously.

"You don' understand, love, it's…it's…"

Benjamin turned his back on her and began stomping towards the door. He'd had enough of this dream.

"STOP!"

He heard her footsteps pounding on the floor, but he didn't realize what she was doing until she tackled him from the back. Benjamin stumbled forward, just barely keeping his footing. The woman had seized him from behind, wrapping her arms around him and clutching for dear life.

"Get _off!" _Benjamin snarled, twisting and thrashing against her; but she was stuck to him like a leech, her face buried into his back and her fingers laced in front of him.

"No! You can't leave! You don' understand, you're…you're not _you!"_

"Woman, let _go of me!"_

Benjamin wriggled and fought so violently the two of them toppled over, hitting the thread-bare carpet with a wrestling _BAM. _Unfortunately, Benjamin twisted so that he landed face first with the strange woman laying on top of him, offering her an easy venue to keep him pinned. He continued to struggle against her, but she somehow managed to get hold of his arms and pull them behind him until he was trapped in an upside-down full Nelson; then she straddled him and threw all of her weight onto them. Even then she was small enough that he was able to roll from side to side, fighting desperately to buck her off; but no matter how he tried, he couldn't quite do it. She simply refused to relinquish her hold on him.

"Sweeney!" she shouted.

The word struck like a hammer against his eardrums and echoed. All at once he stopped fighting and became still. The woman lay on top of him like so much dead weight, and he realized that her body was trembling. For a moment, they remained there, lying still. Benjamin's face was pressed into the deep layer of dust on the floor, and he inhaled particles of it with every breath, but he didn't care. The word was resonating in his mind, blocking out everything else.

_Sweeney._

Slowly, carefully, he felt the woman climbing off of him. He got to his knees, then sat up, staring forward in a daze. The woman kneeled next to him, breathing hard. He turned and looked at her; really looked at her for the first time. Her pale skin, dark, chocolate brown eyes, wild red hair piled on her head, flying and curling in all directions…her face, watching him, waiting, afraid and anxious…

Benjamin watched her through half lidded eyes. "I know you," he whispered.

Slowly, sadly, she nodded.

"Eleanor."

The world was spinning. His head was splitting. Nothing was real.

"Eleanor. Little Eleanor. From down the street. Lucy knew you."

The woman closed her eyes as if she was in pain. She nodded.

Benjamin felt himself getting dizzy. He fought to maintain his grip on consciousness.

"Eleanor. Please tell me where Lucy is."

She opened her eyes, and they were bright with tears. "I'm sorry, Benjamin. I'm sorry. She's gone. She poisoned herself."

Nothing. He felt nothing.

"And Johanna."

"She's gone. She's married a lad named Antony and they left London together."

Still nothing.

"And my Lucy is…dead."

Eleanor squeezed her eyes shut and lifted her hand to her mouth. She looked as though she couldn't continue. Benjamin turned away from her and stared at the ground. For no apparent reason at all, a strange, disjointed memory came into his mind; an image, of himself, kneeling in the middle of an empty street, staring down at his reflection in a puddle of water, his silver friend hanging loosely in his fingers.

…_And my Lucy lies in ashes…_

…_and I'll never see my girl again._

He had one more question.

"Eleanor. Please. Answer me something."

She looked at him. He narrowed his eyes at the carpet.

"Did I kill a man named Charles Conner?"

Eleanor let out a small sob and put her face in her hands. Benjamin needed no other answer.

_Sweeney. Sweeney. Sweeney Sweeney Sweeney Sweeney…_

_Sweeney Todd!_

Sweeney Todd. It was him. It was him.

He felt something, something warm. It was pulsing, almost like a heartbeat; he felt it throbbing, heard it calling to him. He moved his hand to the source of the heat; it was a spot on his hip. His fingers slid over something cool and metallic, and he lifted it out of its holster, holding it up in front of his eyes. He flipped the blade open and looked at his reflection in it.

Benjamin. Benjamin Barker.

And Sweeney Todd.

Two of them. Together.

All at once he understood everything. It was like the curtains were ripped away and sunlight flooded inside of him.

Barker and Todd. There wasn't room for them both.

One of them needed to die.

Nellie's head jerked up when she heard it; the soft metal _snick _of one of Mr. Todd's razors being opened. She looked up just in time to see him pressing the blade calmly against his own throat.

"_SWEENEY!" _she screamed.

She didn't think. She just acted. She lunged forward and seized his wrist, wrenching it away from his neck with all the strength she could possibly muster. She knocked him to the floor, again, and for what felt like an eternity they were locked in a silent struggle, him fighting to draw the glistening blade to his skin and she fighting to pull it away. Nellie grit her teeth and uttered soft cries of desperation. Mr. Todd was weak with exhaustion and his frenzied state of mind, but even so he was still much stronger than her. The sharp silver edge slowly inched closer and closer to his throat. Behind, she heard the rustling of blankets. It was Toby. Her scream had woken him up.

"Mum!" he cried out in shock. "Mr. Todd!"

Mr. Todd flinched only minutely when he heard the boy's voice, but those few precious seconds of distraction were enough. With a final yank, Nellie at last ripped the blade away. It flew from her grasp and sailed across the room, nicking her finger as it went.

"TOBY!" she screamed at the top of her lungs. "GET THE RAZOR!"

Toby immediately obeyed, springing to his feet and diving after the blade.

Beneath her, Mr. Todd snarled, summoning a new well of strength and throwing her off of him. He scrambled to his feet and made a dash at Toby. The boy looked up just in time to see him coming and dodged out of the way, running to the other side of the room, easily evading him with the superior nimbleness of youth. Nellie climbed to her feet and stood up straight, breath heaving and her right hand trickling blood. She looked back and forth between Mr. Todd at one end of the room and Toby on the other. For a moment, the three of them regarded each other.

Then, as if he had all at once realized the utter futility of the situation, Mr. Todd gave up. He visibly gave up; his shoulders relaxed, his face calmed into an expression of complete hopelessness, and he slowly backed away from them until he hit the wall. He slid down it, his head shaking slightly from side to side. He collapsed on the floor, his back to the wall. Slowly, he let his head fall forward until it hung limply on his breast.

For a moment Nellie didn't move, but stood there, alert, waiting, watching him. Then, gradually, she too eased the tension in her body and calmed down, when she was sure that Mr. Todd wasn't going to get up again. She cast a glance at Toby, who was standing with the silver razor clutched between both hands, his eyes wide in fear and confusion.

"Good boy, Toby. You just stay there. Stay there and 'old onto it." The boy nodded fiercely.

Cautiously, as if she were approaching a feral dog that might attack at any second, Nellie took a few steps closer to him. Then a few more. The ancient floorboards creaked beneath her feet; a single drop of blood from the cut on her hand fell down and pattered softly in the dust.

"Mr. T," she said gently, anxiously. He didn't move. "Mr. T?"

Across the room, Toby watched. He swallowed thickly, his hands shaking on the folded blade.

"Mr. Todd," Nellie said quietly. She was right in front of him now. He didn't move from his collapsed position. "Mr. Todd?…..Benjamin?" she tried cautiously.

He didn't move. But from beneath his hidden face, his low, gravelly voice suddenly appeared.

"Mrs. Lovett," he said.

Tears instantly flooded in Nellie's eyes and she let out a shrill cry of relief, falling to her knees beside him and seizing him in her arms. His body was as limp as a rag doll; he didn't even try to fight against her as she pulled him into a hug, wrapping her arms around him and letting his head fall against her chest. Tears streamed down her face, but she made no audible sobs. She squeezed her eyes shut and pursed her lips, rocking him gently.

"Love. I'm sorry," she whispered. "I'm so sorry. I 'ad to tell you. I 'ad no choice."

"Mrs. Lovett," his voice came again, this time further dampened by her body muffling the movement of his mouth.

"Mr. T…Mr. T…I was so scared…I was so scared I'd lost you…"

"Mrs. Lovett."

"What is it, love?"

"He knows."

She stopped rocking. She slowly pulled away so she could look at him. He didn't lift his head; his face was blank and expressionless. His eyes, empty, dead, like black holes, stared downward through half-closed lids.

"What?" Nellie whispered.

"He knows. Barker knows."

A/N; Omg! So his dual personalities both know about each other now! Don't worry; I know this fic seems perpetually angst-ridden and depressing right now, but I'm going to try hard to work some lighter parts in later on. Update soon, hopefully.


	11. Chapter 11

_A/N; Chapter 11! Woot. Sorry it took me a little longer to update than usual--my schedule's been slightly hectic. Just a heads up; this chapter actually does not have Mrs. Lovett, Sweeney or Toby in it. I know, I know…but I had to advance the other part of the story, too. Plus I thought it would build suspense if we left them alone in that rundown house a little longer. Anyways…I just didn't want anyone reading it through and waiting for them to show up. We'll get back to them soon, I promise._

_Chapter 11_

_Amber in the Ashes_

or

_The Ghosts Never Go Away_

Beadle Conner heard a faint, almost imperceptible ripping noise, and he slowly lifted his left hand up from the handle of his cane to look at it. His mustached lip sneered in a disbelieving motion of disgust; he had gripped the amber stone so tightly and furiously for so long that his fingernails had actually ripped through the tips of his gloves. He shook himself and put his hand back down, looking up and sniffing indignantly.

The mess in front of him seemed to go on for blocks. While it was only two buildings that had actually suffered any real fire damage, the clouds of smoke and ashes and particles of floating debris had spread all the way up and down Fleet Street, dirtying the snow and blackening the sides and windows of every house in a three block radius. The blaze had been _monstrous…_it had taken every available fireman in the district almost eight hours to extinguish it altogether, and by the time the last stubborn tongue of flame had been tamped down, the building was barely standing on its foundations. Every window had been blow out, leaving a charred, blackened eye socket where the glass and frame had once been. The east wall of the first floor had crumbled away entirely; men were walking in and out of it dragging huge pieces of wreckage, trying in vain to clear out the area, but no matter how tirelessly they worked, the destruction seemed endless. The shouts and calls of their voices echoed up and down the street, along with the hushed, curious murmurs of the small crowd that had been gradually accumulating since long before dawn.

It was almost nine o'clock now, and the cold winter morning sunlight illuminated the true extent of the devastation. The old building on the corner of Fleet Street would never be the same; it would have to be torn down. It was an unrecognizable heap of wood and ash, a half-gutted brick skeleton with virtually nothing left inside.

Beadle Conner was so absorbed in his silent, fuming rage that he didn't even notice as a uniformed constable approached on his right. It wasn't until the man repeated his name several times that he even blinked.

The Beadle turned his head, eyeing the nervous constable with a sneering glare.

"This had better be good news," he threatened darkly.

The policeman swallowed, wetting his lips and stammering over a small pad of notes in his hand.

He cleared his throat a few times.

"W-Well…sir…that is…Beadle, sir…we…we've found no trace of anyone in the house."

The Beadle stared coldly, through flat eyes. "Excuse me?"

"Well, that…that is to say, sir…there's no one left alive."

The Beadle was working with all his might to suppress the brewing rage just beneath his moustache.

"I can _see _that there's no one a_live. _What I want to know is _where are they? _I want _proof. _I want some remains and I want them _now."_

The constable cleared his throat again. "I'm afraid…there's nothing, sir."

The Beadle's eye twitched. "Nothing."

"No, sir."

"What about bones? Bones do not burn, Constable."

"Well…n-no, sir, but you see they do char, and…well…to be frank, we can't distinguish them from anything else, if there are any."

The Beadle's lips parted in a seemingly understanding gesture. "Oh, _I _see. It isn't that there _aren't _any remains. It's that you blundering halfwits can't tell a human body part from a bit of burnt wood, is _that what I'm hearing?"_

The policeman opened his mouth to respond, but only stood there in stunned silence, his jaw working soundlessly.

"Get out of my sight," Beadle Conner sneered insidiously. "Come back when one of you has something useful to tell me."

As if on cue, at that very second one of the men who had been assigned to foraging through the nearly impassable cellar of the building let out a signal. He extricated himself from the depths of debris, shouting and waving something in the air. The Beadle's ears pricked up and he took a few steps forward towards what used to be the front door of the shop. The filthy, soot covered man came forward, extending his arm and holding out a small object in his palm.

"There y'are, guv'nor," he smiled, dusting himself off and looking pleased with himself. "Found it in the big oven downstairs. Belly o' the stove musta saved it from the fire. Thing ain't even black!"

Beadle Connor seized the tiny glittering object out of the man's hand and held it an inch from his nose, peering at it. He turned it in his hands and the morning sunlight shone through it like specks of diamond. A slow, broad smile spread across his leering face. Without another word, he turned around and distanced himself from the burn site, signaling with his hand to the chief constable as he went. The constable obediently followed after him, stepping over stray pieces of debris.

"Sir?" he puffed, coming up behind the Beadle.

"Constable," Beadle Conner said calmly, eyes glued to the bauble in his fingers, "You may retract the notices and search warrants for my brother Charles. And for Judge Turpin and Beadle Bamford as well."

The constable started, blinking in shock. "Wha…what, sir?"

"You heard me. Retract them. Withdraw the search parties."

"But…why?"

"Because there's no need to search for them any longer. They're dead."

The constable's mouth hovered open for a moment in silence. "Dead, sir?"

"Must I repeat myself? Yes, they're dead, you imbecile. Look here." The Beadle opened his palm and held out the trinket that the man from the cellar had given him. The constable leaned over and peered curiously at it. It was a ring, a thick, sturdy pewter band with a large stone set into it, a chunk of shining amber the size of a raspberry.

"A…a ring, sir?"

"Not any ring, constable," Beadle Conner said with a faint smile on his face. "My father's ring. The ring he bequeathed to my brother on his deathbed. The ring whose partner heirloom I currently hold in my other hand." The Beadle lifted his cane, and the amber set into the handle was identical to that set into the ring.

"Sir! Constable!" a voice suddenly shouted from behind them. They turned around to see two men running up from the burnt wreckage. Each of them were carrying something large and black in each hand, holding them from the handles like suitcases.

"What is this?" the Beadle demanded.

"Kerosene, guv'nor," the first one replied, lifting up the charred and smoking object which he now realized was a large metal container. "Kerosene tins. Empty. 'Nough to set the 'ole bloomin' street up in smoke."

The Beadle eyed the man for a moment, then turned to glance sideways at the policeman.

"Constable," he said calmly. "Organize a task force. We have two fugitives to hunt down."

"F-fugitives, sir?"

"Yes, they did teach you what a _fugitive _is at the academy, didn't they? There are two of them. A man and a woman. I want to see a sketch artist and have posters printed up…_today."_

"And, er…what shall I say are the charges, sir?"

"One count of arson. One count of kidnapping a child. And an estimated three counts of murder."

"Right away, sir," the constable answered, hurrying away as quickly as he could. Beadle Conner watched as the activity around the burned down building switched gears, mutating visibly from a search and rescue to a calculated manhunt. The Beadle smiled, feeling calm and content for the first time that morning.

_That's it, run. Run like the dog you are. Run as much as you like, Mr. Sweeney Todd…._

_0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0_

"Johanna," Anthony whispered, nudging her gently. She moaned in protest, turning her head away.

"Mmmmm. Not now."

"We're nearly in the city, Johanna."

"Then wake me when we're there," she muttered, yawning and folding her arms, resettling herself with her head against his shoulder. Anthony smiled as he watched her, then tilted his head to rest on top of hers. The hansom rambled and clattered along, clicking and creaking over the cobblestones along with occasional sounds of the driver whistling and cracking his reigns.

As Johanna gradually nodded off again, Anthony's smile began to fade. He lifted his fingers and gently stroked a tendril of her long, yellow hair. It seemed only in sleep that his poor bride found any kind of peace anymore. Her waking hours were filled with trembling chills and constant weariness, her eyes either never still or far too still for far too long. She would sit in her chair by the window, staring through the glass like a caged bird, and he knew that she was seeing his face.

It was as an absolute last resort that they had been driven back to London, the place Anthony swore he would never return to as long as there was even the slightest chance of them being discovered by Judge Turpin. If any news…any news at all of….of them being in the city were to reach his ears….he couldn't even complete the thought.

But Anthony was at his wits' end. He didn't know where else to turn. He had nearly cried with relief when Mr. Todd's answer to his letter arrived in the post several weeks ago…he had literally run to their bedroom with it, kneeling beside Johanna and reading her every line aloud. It was good as he could have possibly hoped; Mr. Todd assured them, over and over, in the gentlest terms, that what Johanna had seen was impossible, that she must have been suffering from a terrible delusion. Anthony had finished the letter and looked up with great hope and spirit burning in his eyes…only to have it immediately extinguished when he saw the look on Johanna's face. Her soft grey eyes stared at him in exactly the same haunted, disbelieving trance as before. She slowly shook her head, her face pale and her voice barely a whisper.

"No," was all she said.

Anthony was devastated. For a long moment he couldn't even speak. "But…but…you heard what Mr. Todd--"

"Anthony," she said quietly, tears welling in the corners of her eyes. "I know what I saw."

"But…but…"

"Anthony. I _saw _him. _I saw him," _she began to cry silently.

"You saw something that wasn't there!" Anthony protested, taking her by the shoulders and looking into her face, desperate to try and help her. "There's no shame in it, Johanna, you had a terrible experience! Anyone in your position might have…"

"No," she said firmly. "I don't care what the letter says. I know what I saw."

And now, there they were, sitting in the back of a hansom that had cost them an enormous piece of their savings to have drive them back to the very place that not so many weeks earlier they had been desperate to escape. But Anthony had made up his mind. If this was what it took to save Johanna from her horrible terrors, than this was what he had to do. He had to take her back there…back to the very room where the whole thing had happened…and prove to her that what she'd seen hadn't been real. He remembered the terrible fight they had had two days ago, when he had made up his mind to take them back to London and prove the truth to her. He remembered with a burning pain in his heart the way she had looked at him, the way her eyes had widened in panic, the way she'd fought and screamed when he tried to calm her down.

"_NO! NO!"_

"Johanna, calm down!"

"NO! I'm not going! I'm _not going!"_

"You have to do this, Johanna! You have to face this!"

"No! Anthony, please, please, Anthony, please don't make me…_please don't make me…" _she degenerated into feverish sobs, falling towards him and seizing his shirt in her fingers, burying her face in his chest. He held her and rocked her, pressing his mouth into her hair, willing himself to be strong.

"Please don't take me back there…please…I can't go back there Anthony…please don't make me do this…"

"Johanna. Listen to me."

"He'll kill me Anthony! He'll kill me! He'll cut my throat if I go back there…I can't go back there…"

"No one is going to hurt you!"

"Please…please…I won't go back…._I won't go back…."_

"Johanna. Listen."

She muttered incoherently to herself, the words damped into his chest.

"My love. Listen to me. I'm going to help you."

The muttering gradually lessened, and Johanna grew silent and still, clutching onto him for dear life.

"I'm going to help you face this. I'm not going to let you go on this way. I love you."

As the hansom crossed into the inner district of London, a grey, freezing rain began to drizzle down, turning to specks of ice on the glass panes. It was nearly twilight, the winter sun beginning to set behind the black haze of chimney smoke that floated perpetually over the city like a shroud. Anthony stroked Johanna's hair absently as he stared out the window.

_His horrible face….his horrible face…red with another man's innocent blood…_

He didn't know how many times he had heard her moaning those words in her sleep. Too many. It was time to end this nightmare once and for all. He didn't care if he had to ask Mr. Todd to let them live with him for a week, if that's what it took…_he was going to save her._

Mr. Todd…the thought of his friend led him to his next concern, which was that they hadn't written to Mr. Todd in advance to let him know they were coming. It wasn't that he was afraid his friend would turn them away…he knew Mr. Todd would never do that, not when it was plain how much they needed his help…it was that it would have been so much safer if they had been able to collaborate a meeting time beforehand. That way, there would be less danger of their presence in London possibly being discovered by someone who would contact Judge Turpin. Anthony silently cursed himself again for not planning ahead…but he hadn't been able to help himself. He had become so desperate, so utterly frantic to rescue his beloved wife from the hysterics that were sapping her strength and on the verge of threatening her very life…he couldn't wait around for another letter to reach Mr. Todd before taking action. They had to do something _now._

"Please Anthony…" she had whispered, her face hidden against him. "Please don't make me do this."

"I have to. Johanna, don't you understand…I_ have to. _It's the only way I'll ever get you back. You have too see for yourself that it _didn't really happen. _You have to be strong."

"Anthony…" she wept quietly. "I'm so afraid. I don't even know his name…but I can't escape him. I can't escape his face. He follows me everywhere."

"I know. I know, sweetheart. But you have to trust me. Believe me when I say he _isn't real. _He's not going to hurt you. I'm going to prove it."

"Never…never…never…"

"Never what, Johanna?"

"The ghosts. They never go away. Anthony, they never go away. _Forget my face. Forget my face, _he said_. _I'll never forget his face."

"I'll be with you, Johanna! I'll be with you all the time. I'll keep you safe. I'm going to _makes the ghosts go away._"

"Stay with me," she cried. "Please stay with me Anthony."

"Don't be silly," he whispered, kissing the crown of her head. "I would never leave you. Never."

The hansom rounded a corner, and Anthony recognized the familiar rooftops and street fronts of the farthest end of Fleet Street. They would be nearing Mr. Todd's barber shop in just a few minutes. Anthony felt a great, thick lump forming in the back of his throat. He swallowed it down and steeled his jaw, forcing himself to keep his nerve. He put his arm around Johanna and pulled her close to him. She sighed in her sleep.

_We have to be smart, _he told himself over and over again. _We have to be strong and we have to be smart. We have to keep our heads and not give ourselves away._

_Mr. Todd…._

_Please, please, be home…._

A/N; I got a tip that Anthony's name has a silent _h _in it, so that's how I'll be spelling it from now on. There also may be some confusion about Beadle Conner's name; I changed it a couple times in chapter six, I believe, but it's definitely set at _Conner_ now. Remember, reviews make me smile! I'll try my hardest to update by tomorrow.

_._


	12. Chapter 12

_A/N; Chapter 12! Woot! I hope you like it…I pretty much did this instead of sleeping tonight._

_Chapter 12_

_Times Is Hard, Sir_

or

_Two Kinds Of Men and Only Two…_

Snoring. That was the noise that woke her up.

Nellie's eyelids fluttered softly, opening and closing; bright, blinding white winter sunshine was filtering through the cracks in the dusty old house, even in spite of the countless rags she filled them with to try and trap the precious heat inside.

The heat…that was another thing. She woke up shivering, her breath visible in front of her face. The room was freezing. She glanced over at the fireplace and saw that the embers were almost entirely dead; only a few lumps of glowing charcoal remained, struggling for life.

_Thank 'eaven we slept with coats on…._

Nellie let her eyes fall closed again, exhaling deeply. She was _exhausted. _Her eyelids felt like they were made of lead. It was as if the last five hours of sleep hadn't even made a dent in relieving the massive burden of weariness laid on her by the day before. But she had no choice…she had to get up and rekindle the fire. Coats or no, they couldn't sit there shivering in the cold all morning. The absolute _last _thing they needed now was to all come down with pneumonia.

Nellie took a deep breath, let it out, and moved to get up. But the moment she did, she realized that she was being held down on all sides by heavy, dampening weight. She tried to move again, but it was no good; her legs and her entire right side were pinned down, her back upright against the once paper-covered wall of the decrepit room.

Wait…she fell asleep against the wall? Why did she do that? Scanning her memory briefly, Nellie tried to remember all that had happened last night…Mr. Todd's fainting spell, the very sudden, very unwelcome visit from Benjamin…his razor flying through the air…his head in her arms while she cried…_Barker knows…_

_Oh, _she suddenly realized as the memory rushed back to her. _That's right…_

Nellie looked down, remembering the position in which the three of them had somehow fallen asleep, and shook her head lightly. _I swear…it's a damn good thing my 'ead's stuck good n' tight on my shoulders…_

The weights holding her pinned in a sitting position against the wall were Toby and Mr. Todd. Toby was the weight on her side; he had fallen asleep sitting next to her and fallen onto her in the night, his head on her shoulder. And then…a faint blush warmed on her cheeks, in spite of the bitter chill in the air…Mr. Todd had fallen asleep across her legs, his head cradled in her lap. Nellie looked down at him, his pale, peaceful face, eyes closed and features completely blank; not only had he fallen asleep in her lap, he had actually fallen asleep _facing her. _

Nellie's heart thumped in her chest like a drum. She swallowed, the pink in her cheeks darkening as she looked at him. For a moment, she closed her eyes and drank in the moment, this rare moment of closeness with her two men, the only family she had…but especially with…

She shook her head, opening her eyes and willing herself back into practicality. She had to get up and start the fire again…yes, that was what she'd been going to do…but how would she stand without waking Mr. Todd or Toby? She sat there a moment longer, thinking, but could come up with no good solution. Sighing, preparing herself for the inevitable reaction to come, she gently leaned to her right and kissed Toby on the cheek.

"Toby," she said soothingly in his ear. "Come on, pum'kin. Time to wake up."

Gradually, Toby stirred, groaning and turning to the other side. Nellie smiled and tousled his hair roughly.

"Come on love. Up an' at 'em."

"Uggghhh….it's…._freezin' _in 'ere…." the boy grumbled, rubbing his face with his hands and shivering.

"Yes, well, I'll remedy that jus' as soon as I get my legs back," Nellie muttered. Toby then looked down at Mr. Todd, noticing for the first time the impossibly intimate position he was in. The boy blinked, then began to fidget with embarrassment, hastily glancing away.

"I…er…I'll go n' fetch more wood for the fire, mum. We're nearly out."

Nellie was about to protest, then sensed Toby's urging desire to remove himself from the situation. His nervousness only heightened her own, and she felt the pink stealing back into her face.

"Alright, dear," she said, clearing her throat. "But…make sure you bundle up good n' tight, now. An' don' stay out there too long, you'll catch your death of cold yet."

"I won't," Toby promised, seizing handfuls of scarves and gloves and rushing out the door like a whirlwind before even putting them on. He slammed the door behind him and the whole foundation of the house seemed to shake. Nellie watched the place where he had been for a few seconds, then looked back down at Mr. Todd. It still hadn't seemed to fully sink in…the fact that he was…well…just _laying _there. In all the time she had been with him, this was the most…this was the furthest….

She cleared her throat again, willing the thoughts away.

_Got to be practical…can't be thinkin' of silly nonsense like that at a time like this…_

Cautiously, almost the tiniest bit fearfully, Nellie leaned over Mr. Todd, touching him gently on the shoulder. She swallowed thickly, bracing herself. Lord only knew what he would do when he awoke to find himself…_there._

"Mr. T?" she said, shaking him slightly. He didn't move. "Mr. T?" she shook a bit more vigorously.

For a long moment, he didn't respond at all. "Mr. Todd," she said louder, nudging him.

Then, without any warning at all, his eyes suddenly shot open…fully open, all at once, and in an instant there were staring square into each other's faces, barely a few inches apart. Nellie opened her mouth and shrieked, jerking back. Mr. Todd instantly snapped his eyes shut, seizing his head in his hand and wincing.

"_Quiet, _woman!!" he snapped, his voice rough and hoarse.

Nellie clapped a hand over her heart, her chest heaving. "Bloody 'ell, Mr. T!" she cried, shooting him a sharp stare. "What are ya tryin' to _do to me??"_

Mr. Todd cringed visibly with every word she said. His recoiling only served to turn his head further into her lap, exacerbating their already precarious situation. However, he seemed not to have yet noticed where he was.

"Mrs. Lovett," he ground out through clenched teeth. "Shut _up."_

Nellie exhaled, her heart still pounding wildly. "Goodness, love…ain't never seen a man wake like that in my 'ole…."

"_Shut up!"_

"Oh, alright, no need to get upset," she whispered crossly. "For 'eaven's sake…"

Mr. Todd groaned softly, gripping his head tighter. Nellie's brow immediately relaxed; her eyes softened and her lips thickened into a worried gaze.

"Y'alright, love? 'Ow d'you feel?"

He didn't answer, only held his head and kept his eyes shut. Nellie gently put a hand on his forehead. A small knot grew in her stomach.

"You're too warm, Mr. Todd," but even as she said it, she realized he was shivering with cold.

She felt it come on almost immediately; the transfer into her practical, almost motherly state of mind, the same change that had come over her the night before when Toby and Mr. Todd had collapsed outside. Setting her mouth in determination, Nellie gently took hold of Mr. Todd's shoulders.

"Love, I need you to move."

Mr. Todd groaned again. "Why?" was the only word he uttered.

"I need to get up."

"Then get up."

"I can't, love, don' you see?"

Slowly, Mr. Todd's eyes opened a crack. For an extended moment he stared forward, squinting as if having trouble making out what was in front of him. Then, gradually, she saw the change come over his face…his nostrils flared, his eyes seemed to burn with disbelief, his jaw clenched so tightly it pulsed in his temple. Ever so slowly, he sat up, lifting his head from her lap and turning his back to her. She watched him curiously, and found herself struggling to maintain a spurt of laughter when she saw that the hair on the side of his head that had lain on her was alternately flattened and spraying wildly in different places, nearly sticking straight up. Mr. Todd crossed his legs on the floor and sat there like a statue, unmoving, staring at the wall. Nellie wanted to say something to him, reach out and touch his back, but she sensed that it was better not to. Subconsciously, she had been expecting him to completely erupt when he saw how they were…together…but somehow, his silence spoke far greater volumes. Nellie got to her feet and dusting off the skirts of her long coat.

"Well," she said, attempting to put on her best _that's-that-then _tone of voice. "I…I certainly 'ope Toby gets in soon with that firewood. In the meantime, I think we've got a bit more from what was 'ere when we came in…"

She made her way over to the hearth, where there remained only one glowing ember that looked like it could be coaxed back to life. Nellie busied herself piling small bits of tinder and shredded rags into the fireplace, gently puffing bursts of air on the ember until blazing orange sparks began to drift up from it. After a few arduous moments, a bit of fabric caught fire, and the flames licked slowly over the wood, smoke rising. Nellie sighed in relief and sat back, holding her hands out over the virgin blaze, her icy skin warming at last. She looked over her shoulder to where Mr. Todd still sat by the wall. He hadn't moved.

"For goodness' sake, Mr. T, get over 'ere an' warm your bones. You'll be froze into a solid block 'fore I know it."

If he heard her, he made no sign of it. She stared at him for a long moment and she could have sworn he wasn't even blinking. His face was blank, but then, not quite…something almost invisible was smoldering behind his eyes, something like a paralyzed look of shock. Nellie sighed, tilting her head slightly to the side. She should have known.

_One little scrap of affection…the littlest human contact….an' he goes and shuts up like a turtle._

"Mr. Todd, be reasonable. You're catchin' somethin', if I ain't mistaken, and it's on'y goin' to get worse if you won't come and warm yourself up." She might as well have been talking to a plank of wood. The barber just sat there, his back slightly hunched and the hair on one side of his head still spraying everywhere. Nellie's jaw twitched, suddenly stung by a harsh swell of annoyance. She got to her feet and stormed across the room, bending over and seizing him under the arms.

"Come on, you great stupid thing," she practically scolded him. "On your feet!"

Mr. Todd was not quite childish or indifferent enough to go limp in her hands…or maybe he just wasn't noticing _any_thing she did. Either way, he let himself be pulled to his feet easily enough, and he moved like a sleepwalker, allowing himself to be led over and sat down again in front of the steadily growing fire. Satisfied that he was at least near the hearth, Nellie sniffed and dusted her hands again.

"Alright, love, you jus' sit tight there an' let me find you some breakfast," she said cheerily, turning and rummaging through one of the enormous carpet bags. They hadn't been able to bring much food with them…only a few precious non-perishables that they'd had laying around the kitchen. A few loaves of bread, some cheese, apples, dry oats, a couple bottles of gin ( funny how back at the pie shop they had seemed to be constantly in want of groceries, but their stores of gin were never allowed to run dry )…not enough to keep them going longer than a few days. They had brought a decent bit of money with them…soon, they would have to find a town so Nellie could replenish their supplies.

As she worked to prepare the meager breakfast, slicing up an apple and sandwiching the slices between bits of bread and cheese, Nellie felt a strange kind of lightness settling over her…if she dared to believe it, it was almost like happiness. For a brief moment she felt the urge to pucker her lips and start whistling. Then, it came, like a dagger in the back of her sudden joy…she happened to look up, and there it was, sitting innocently on the floor on the other side of the room. The pale light from outside played on one side of it, lighting it with blue and silver, while the light from the fire shone off the other in blazing orange and gold. It was Mr. Todd's razor. Toby must have fallen asleep with it in his hands and dropped it sometime during the night.

Nellie froze with a half-peeled apple in one hand and a paring knife in the other. She stared at the razor, her eyes narrowing and the happiness draining from her body as quickly as it had come. She put down the food and closed her eyes briefly. Then, forcing herself to move, she picked up the makeshift meal and stood up, carrying it to Mr. Todd. She kept one for herself as well and set aside one for Toby…though she was beginning to get the suspicion that the boy was going to keep himself absent from the house for as long as he deemed possible. _Oh well….least we'll get plenty of firewood out of it._

"'Ere, love," she said softly nudging Mr. Todd's forearm with the bread. Unsurprisingly, he didn't take it.

Nellie sighed. "We can do this all day long, Mr. T. Are you goin' to take it or not? You've got to eat _sometime, _you great senseless…"

"Mrs. Lovett," he interrupted.

Nellie froze with a slice of apple between her teeth. She paused, then bit through it with an impossibly loud _crunch. _

"Yes, love?" she said around it as she chewed, eyeing him cautiously. There was something in his voice, in his face…something was wrong.

He stared into the fire, not looking at her. The flames danced in his swimming black eyes.

"You have to take them from me."

She stared at the side of his face. She swallowed the apple, then set the rest down. Her breath was catching in her throat.

"Take what, Mr. T?"

"My friends," he answered, his voice sounding strange and hollow. "You have to take them and keep them from me."

Nellie's lips parted. Her eyes narrowed in disbelief. "What?"

"You have to _take them, _I said."

Nellie didn't know what to say. "But…but…Mr. Todd, you…you never let _anyone…"_

"I _know that," _he said quietly, with just a faint hint of irritation. "But we have no choice. You…saw what happened. Last night."

Images, horrible images she had been wanting desperately to forget, sprang into Nellie's mind and she closed her eyes, trying not to shudder. Mr. Todd, his eyes empty, like the eyes of a man already dead, as he lifted the razor to his own throat, preparing to….she couldn't even think it.

But no. It hadn't been Mr. Todd holding the blade at that moment. It had been _him…_Benjamin Barker…

"They're in my bag, Mrs. Lovett. Take three of them to keep with you and give three to the boy. Never let me see them. Never tell me where they are. Hold them with you when you sleep."

Nellie was struggling to process this unbelievable request. Mr. Todd, giving up his razors? His _razors, _his friends,the things he loved more than anything else in the world? More than any_one _else in the world?

"Mr. Todd," she said softly. "Is it…is it because of?"

The fire danced. It was the only movement in his face. He spoke like he was made of stone.

"I have no choice. There's no way of knowing when…he'll…be back again."

Nellie shivered. _Benjamin Barker. _She had never had any dark associations with Mr. Todd's old name before…she had only remembered that man as one remembers a dream…half faded and forgotten. She had loved Benjamin Barker long before he was transported away to Australia. But her love for him had died the same way he did…no…not died…only moved forward, been replaced by her Sweeney. She had not given the idea much thought before…her love for him was as natural and expected as anything. But now, there were actually _two of them. _Sweeney and Benjamin, Barker and Todd. And one of them was trying to kill the other. The real question was…

Nellie wet her lips, swallowing. She had to ask…she had to…but it fought against every impulse in her body to force herself to form the words.

"I have to ask you somethin', love."

Mr. Todd said nothing, but she knew he was listening.

Nellie squeezed her eyes shut. All of a sudden she felt a pain that was beyond tears. It burned with a horrible dryness inside her.

"Who is it that we 'ave to keep the razors from…Benjamin, or Sweeney?"

The words seemed to take form and fall visibly between them like bricks, dampening the room and making the silence that followed a hundred times heavier. Nellie watched him, waiting, aching. She didn't know if he would answer her or not.

_Not Sweeney, _she thought, and for a startling moment, she discovered that she was actually, honest to God, praying for it.

_Not Sweeney…not Sweeney…not Sweeney…_

He opened his mouth. "Keep them away from me," was all he muttered.

A silent breath rushed from between Nellie's lips, and she closed her eyes as the burn faded away. She didn't know how…she had no idea how…but she heard his answer in those words.

_It's not him, _she thought, relief flooding every corpuscle of her body. _It's not him…thank heaven, he doesn't want to kill himself…it's not him, it's Barker…_

But at the same time that the thought brought relief, it brought with it also a surreal, nameless dread, a concept of horror that for a moment Nellie found difficult to even wrap her mind around.

_Barke__r wants him dead. Barker…wants Sweeney…to die. And he doesn't even care about killing himself to do it…_

…_in all of the whole human race, Mrs. Lovett, there are two kinds of men and only two…_

Nellie opened her eyes. Who, in all of the world, would have ever imagined that someday, quiet, smiling, laughing, well-behaved Benjamin Barker…Benjamin Barker, who had never put one toe out of line in his entire life…would have ended up being the kind of man who _wasn't _staying put in his proper place?

She didn't even feel the impulse coming. It was upon her before she could do a thing. Without even realized what she was doing until it had already happened, Nellie leaned forward onto her hands and knees, putting her face beside Mr. Todd's. She did it one fluid motion without pausing; she put her hand on the opposite side of his head, pulled him close to her, and pressed her lips to his right temple. She had done this before. She had done it several times before, in one go, even, and when she had Mr. Todd had gone stiff as a board and paid her as much attention as if she wasn't even there. But this time…something was different. This wasn't a peck on the cheek in the middle of a picnic, when she was in a giddy mood about her dreams of traveling to the sea. This wasn't a wickedly rapturous dance brought on by the delightful notion of baking people into pies. This was something different. She didn't pull away from him. She sat there, her mouth against his skin, for what felt like a long, long moment.

And when she finally did release him and sit back again, she knew that he had not been able to ignore her. Not this time. Mr. Todd's eyes were open…not wide, not visibly shocked, but open. The life had returned to them. He turned his head and looked at her, and it was the same look he had given her that day so long ago in his barber shop.

_We could have a life, you and I._

They looked at each other, and Nellie knew that she should be feeling as if she wanted to smile, but she didn't. Instead, she pursed her lips shut and turned away.

_Everything is going to change now._

"Eat your breakfast, dearie. Times is goin' to be 'ard for us now, and I can't have you faintin' all over yourself again when we set out tomorrow."

She leaned close to him, and for just a moment, they were so close that their foreheads nearly touched.

"I won't let 'im, Mr. T," she whispered. "I won't let 'im."

Before Mr. Todd could say or do anything, the front door banged open and in came Toby, his face almost completely hidden behind scarves and collars and his arms heaped high with sticks and scraps kindling.

"Ah, that's 'ow it's done, Toby!" Nellie beamed, getting to her feet and hurrying to help him unload the wood. "We'll be toasty as pies in an oven tonight, with all this…"

She was smiling, but only with her lips. She turned and looked over her shoulder at Mr. Todd as she helped Toby to make the wood into two piles. He wasn't looking at her…but he was staring at the spot where she had been only a moment ago.

_Sweeney, _she thought, watching him, silhouetted there against the bright glow of the now roaring fire. _Everything is going to change._

"Come, Toby," she said quietly. "Eat up…I've got a nice breakfast for ya. You've got to get your strength back up. We're leavin' tomorrow mornin'."

"Leavin'? But where are we gonna go, mum?"

"I don' know, love," Nellie answered, her eyes fixed on Mr. Todd's back. As she watched, he slowly turned back to the fire, and then sat perfectly still. "I don' know."

_Everything is going to change._

A/N; And there you have it. Not a _whole _lot happened in this chapter, but oh well…I think I'll take a little more time on the next one and really have it go somewhere. Fresh thanks to everyone who reviewed me! ( big smiles ) Especially all you who have been faithfully reading this story and commenting on every chapter! You guys are the best!


	13. Chapter 13

A/N; Chapter 13! _Finally! _I'm sooo sorry it took me this long to update…things have just been getting busier and busier for me. I hope the extra long chapter makes up for the wait. Enjoy!

Reviews make me smile!

Disclaimer; Don't own Sweeney Todd. Not getting paid to write about it/him.

Chapter 13

_Our Poor Mr. Todd_

or

_Indifference_

"Anthony," Johanna said, her voice quiet with a mixture of curiosity, confusion, and nameless dread. "Are you sure we're on the right street?"

No response. Johanna turned and looked at her husband sitting beside her.

"Anthony?"

His mouth was ever so slightly ajar, his brows slowly knitting into a narrow squint of disbelief as he leaned forward, staring through the carriage window.

"No," was all he said. "No, no, no…"

Their hansom clattered to a rickety stop, and Anthony didn't wait for the driver to open their door before bursting out. Johanna followed behind him, clutching her boisterous skirts in one hand as she climbed down to the ground. Her feet splashed in a shallow puddle, and she noticed with immense curiosity that the water was black…not merely muddy or dirty, but _black, _like ink. She moved to stand beside Anthony and the two of them looked onward together in silence.

It was ash that had blackened the water. Ash had blackened nearly everything on the entire corner of Fleet Street. Looming in front of them was Mrs. Lovett's Pie Shop…or rather, what used to be Mrs. Lovett's Pie shop, and what was now a charred, smoking heap of brick barely able to stand on its cornerstones.

After a long moment of suspended reality, Johanna found her voice. Without knowing it, she had inched closer to Anthony and was clutching tightly to his arm.

"What happened?" she asked softly.

Anthony was shaking his head and blinking. "No, no…this can't be…"

There were a few policemen lingering together at the east side of the building, their heads together and backs to the evening chill. They appeared to be discussing something, and a few of them were flipping small notepads. Among them was one man not dressed in a Scotland Yard uniform; he was wearing a long navy coat and a distinguished hat, and he leaned forward on a cane with both hands as he listened to the hurried jabbering of a short, particularly anxious-looking officer.

"Anthony," Johanna tried again, nervously squeezing his arm tighter. Ever since they had crossed the line back into the city limits of London, Johanna had felt a small, pinching needle of unrest digging deeper and deeper inside of her. Just being back among the dirty buildings and gloomy streets, the prison walls and the downcast faces…it seemed to bring back all in one swoop every horrible memory, every lonely hour, every tormented night spent sitting awake, wondering who was watching her…_the ghosts, _the ghosts of her sheltered, isolated, miserable past…they were all around her, watching her from the dark windows, waiting around every corner. And even worse….worst of all…_he _was somewhere in this city, lurking, somewhere in the endless grey labyrinth of streets and buildings. For a moment Johanna closed her eyes, willing her pounding heart to still and her catching breath to calm, but the instant she was in the darkness she saw it…his face, staring at her, eyes black and soulless, blood drying on his skin. Johanna's chest heaved and she opened her eyes.

"Anthony," she tried, but still he didn't move or answer her. "Anthony, what in the world do you think--"

But before she could finish, Anthony had seized her hand in his and yanked her forward as he took off at a mad dash toward the group of constables. She could hear his labored breathing as they ran the short distance, dodging small piles of ash and bits of debris lingering in the street…but she knew it wasn't from the exercise. The panic in his breath was tangible.

"SIR!" he shouted as they drew near. Every man in the small group looked up. Anthony skidded to a stop, releasing Johanna's hand. For a moment, it seemed he was too incoherent to even form the words. One of the kindlier-looking policemen reached out and put a hand on his shoulder.

"Slow down, lad. What's the matter?"

"What…what…_happened?" _Anthony choked out, his voice frantic. "What happened to this building?"

"Easy, son, easy. Take a breath before you make yourself faint. There was a fire last night."

"Where is Mr. Todd?" Anthony pleaded. "Mr. Todd, the man who lived here, and his landlady Mrs. Lovett…where are they? Where are they? Are they alright??"

"Easy, lad! I told you, you're going to--"

Suddenly, the man who'd been standing at the back of the group, the one who was obviously not a member of Scotland Yard, pushed the constable away in mid-sentence and stood before Anthony, staring down at him with a steely, questioning look in his eyes.

"What was that you asked, boy?" he said quietly.

"Please, you've got to tell me where Mr. Todd is!" Anthony repeated, his voice growing more desperate. "Please, tell me he's alright! Tell me they're both alright!"

"You know Mr. Todd, do you, lad?" the tall man asked. For a moment, Johanna forgot Anthony and her burning concern for him and turned to look at the man in front of him. She looked at his face…long nose, perfectly groomed moustache, sneering, down-turned eyes, exceedingly calm…too calm…the calm of a fox following a mouse into a corner…

"Anthony," Johanna whispered, stepping behind him and touching his shoulder. "Anthony, I think we should…"

"Silence, child," the man suddenly snapped, flashing her a dismissive glance before turning back to Anthony. "I asked you a question, boy. Are you acquainted with the man whose home this was? You know a man named Sweeney Todd?"

"Yes, yes, Mr. Todd is a dear friend of mine," Anthony cried. "Now, _please, _you _must _tell me where he is! For God's sake, please, tell me he isn't…."

"Calm yourself, son," the man said, a faint smile suddenly forming on his lips. Johanna's eyes narrowed.

"There's no need to worry," the man went on, subtly lifting a gloved hand and placing it on Anthony's shoulder. "I assure you, both Mr. Todd and his landlady are alive."

Anthony closed his eyes and lifted a hand to his face. For a moment he was silent, and when he looked up again his eyes were bleary.

"Thank God," he whispered, turning to Johanna and pulling her towards him in a momentary embrace. "Thank God, Johanna, they're not hurt…"

"Anthony!" Johanna whispered fiercely, trying not to look over his shoulder at the wickedly smiling face of the strange man. "Anthony, I think we should get out of he--"

"However…you did say you were friends with Mr. Todd, yes, son?"

"That's right," Anthony replied, again turning to face him. Johanna bit her lip. "And I need desperately to see him, as soon as possible, if he isn't hurt. Can you tell me where to find him?"

"I am afraid, that at this time, I cannot," the man replied, and Johanna immediately recognized something in the tone of his voice…something dark, something evil, something she was certain she had heard somewhere before.

"What? Why?" Anthony asked.

"You see, my boy…what is your name, by the way?"

Johanna seized his sleeve, her eyes burning into the side of his face to try and make him look at her, but she could see in his expression that he was too distressed by his recent moment of panic to notice her.

_Please, Anthony, whatever you do, don't…_

"Anthony Hope," he blurted out. Johanna closed her eyes.

The man smiled. "A pleasure. Well, you see, Mr. Hope…the trouble is, _no one _knows exactly where your friend Mr. Todd has gotten off to. We found no one inside when the fire was extinguished, and no one was here to meet us when the alarm was raised."

"But…then how do you know they're both alive??"

"Calm yourself, Mr. Hope! I give you my word that they are both alive. We found no evidence of bodies in the ashes…no bones, nothing, no remains of any kind. If they had been inside, we would have found them. No, the two of them must have been able to escape the fire alive."

"But where are they?" Anthony pleaded. "You don't understand, sir, I cannot stress enough how badly I need to find Mr. Todd."

The man had been smiling already, but slowly, gradually, Johanna watched an entirely new kind of smile emerge from the old one. She felt a deep pit grow in her stomach when she suddenly realized where she had seen that kind of look before, and where she had heard that tone in his voice…it was the exact same sort of oily confidence and suppressed, sadistic joy that had come over Judge Turpin every time he had looked at her, every time he had stood behind her, watching her at her needle work…every time he had touched a slimy, stroking hand on her shoulder and called her _child_…Johanna felt the bile rise in her throat just being reminded of that smile. She dug her fingers as far as she could into Anthony's sleeve, but the boy was oblivious.

"Well, then, my good man, it would seem that you and I have something in common," the man said gently, the faint smile never wavering.

"What do you mean?"

"You see son, the good men of Scotland Yard and I have been examining this building since early this morning, and we have come to the conclusion that this fire was no mere accident. This was a crime, a fully motivated act of arson."

Anthony blinked. "Arson? But…by _who?"_

The man shook his head sadly, and Johanna stared at him with an ever-growing combination of fear and disgust.

"That, we have no way of knowing," he said. "_But…_if what we've been able to judge from the remains of the fire are any indication, we believe this was done by someone with the direct intention of murdering the occupants of the residence."

Anthony's lips parted. "Mr. Todd…Mrs. Lovett…"

"I'm sorry, Mr. Hope, but I believe that is the case. Now, as I've said, we've ascertained for certain that the two of them were able to escape alive, but we have been organizing a search of the entire area for hours, and have been unable to find them. We believe that the two of them may have fled the city in fear of their lives…in fear of whoever it is that may be after them with a murderous intent. Mr. Hope, you said you were a close friend of Mr. Todd…tell me, can you think of anyone, _anyone, _who for some reason may have wanted either he or his landlady dead?"

Johanna's heart stopped. _Oh, God, Anthony…._she looked up at him, eyes wide, breath baited, pleading silently…._For God's sake, Anthony, don't say the judge….._

Anthony opened his mouth quickly as if her were about to speak, then paused, and slowly closed it. Johanna gave an enormous inward sigh of relief.

"No, sir," Anthony muttered. "I can't think of anyone."

The man's smile flickered…just barely. "I see. Well…then that brings me to my next question, Mr. Hope."

"Yes?" Anthony looked up, again desperate and waiting.

"It is of the utmost importance that we find Mr. Todd and Mrs. Lovett. You see, the truth of the matter is, we believe that this entire incident may be bigger than only the fire and the two of them. You may have heard news of the recent tragedy…both the honorable Judge Turpin and my predecessor, the Beadle Bamford, passed away recently under extremely odd circumstances."

Johanna felt Anthony start, and knew that she had done so herself as well. For a moment, both of them stood as rigid as boards, identical looks of shock plastered on their faces. Then, they turned and looked at each other, and no words could possibly express the feeling.

_He's…dead?_

_Judge Turpin is __**dead?**_

Johanna felt like she was floating. It was as if the word wouldn't register in her mind.

_Dead. Dead._

_How could he be dead? _

"P-passed away, sir?" Anthony stuttered, his voice hollow.

"Yes, I'm afraid so. Ah, goodness, where are my manners? I do believe I have completely neglected to introduce myself! My name is Howard Conner, and I am the new practicing Beadle of this district."

Anthony and Johanna said nothing. The mere comprehension of the fact was still too great a task.

He was gone. Judge Turpin was _gone_…and Beadle Bamford, as well. The two people, the two sources from which all of their trouble and fear and danger and pain in life had stemmed…were dead.

_Dead._

_Did that mean…could it really mean…they were free?_

"My question to you, Mr. Hope…" the beadle Howard Conner continued, clearly oblivious to their paralyzed shock, "…is this. Can you lead us to your friend, Mr. Todd?"

Johanna forced herself out of her reverie and whipped her head toward Anthony. He in turn was looking at her. For a long moment they were both silent. Everything was moving too fast.

"Mr. Hope?" the Beadle repeated, and Johanna could sense the true vile nature of his temperament beginning to surface through his poorly hidden impatience.

Anthony blinked, and turned back to the beadle. "Help you…find him? Mr. Todd?"

"Yes, that is what I said. You are close friends with him, are you not? You have told me so yourself repeatedly. Scotland yard wishes desperately to find Mr. Todd and Mrs. Lovett so that we can put them under our direct protection. You see, as I was going to say before, we have sufficient reason to believe that whoever may be responsible for the murders of Judge Turpin and Beadle Bamford--"

"_Murders?" _Johanna heard herself interrupt. "You only said they had died!"

"--may very well be the same culprit who is now, for whatever reason, after Mr. Todd and his landlady," the Beadle finished speaking without even glancing at Johanna. She stared at him incredulously. What was this man playing at?

"But…why would you think that, Mr.--Beadle, Conner, sir?" Anthony asked.

"Because both the Judge and the Beadle were seen near and in Mr. Todd's barbering establishment the night that both of them disappeared."

"_Disappeared?" _Johanna cried. She again went unnoticed.

_What is going on here? First dead, then murdered, then disappeared….what can it all mean? What does he want with us?_

"We know unfortunately little of the circumstances, as of yet," the Beadle went on. "All we have been able to confirm for certain is that the Judge and the Beadle have been murdered, and that they have some mutual connection with Mr. Todd. And now, the occurrence of this disastrous fire, and the fleeing of Mr. Todd and Mrs. Lovett…it all intertwines into only one plausible theory. Because of whatever dealings he may have had with the Judge, Mr. Todd is in grave danger. He must be found so that he can be put under the protection of the police and so that we can use him to gain any possible information on the Judge and Beadles' killer."

The Beadle finished speaking, and folded his hands calmly on the amber head of his cane. His narrow eyes bored into Anthony's, staring at him, rendering him immobile.

"I am asking for your assistance, as a citizen and as a friend to our poor Mr. Todd. You may be able to offer invaluable information to aid us in finding him. Will you do it, son?"

Johanna dugs her fingers tighter into Anthony's sleeve. She wanted to run away, dragging her husband after her if she had to. She didn't know why she was shaking with terror as violently as she was…she wasn't sure why the very presence of this Beadle Conner filled her with such an inexplicable dread. But he did. She wanted to run…to escape before Anthony could agree to helping him. But she knew she couldn't. She was rooted to the spot. It wasn't five seconds before she heard him say it--

"Alright," Anthony whispered.

Johanna closed her eyes and turned to put her forehead against his shoulder.

_Oh, Anthony…_

But deep down, she knew they'd had no other choice. If Anthony had said no, they would have been arrested, she was sure of it. She had overheard enough wicked dealings between the Judge and Beadle Bamford to know about how police business was done in London. It was a simple system, really; either you did what they wanted, or they destroyed you. And then once you were destroyed you did what they wanted.

A cool, calm, venomous smile spread across Conner's face. "Excellent, my boy. Excellent. Come with me."

"What? Wait…" Anthony began to protest as the Beadle took him by the shoulder and began steering him towards a coach parked at the side of the road. The Beadle looked around at him.

"Yes?"

"Where are we going?" Anthony demanded. "My wife and I…we came here hoping to find Mr. Todd. Now that…well…we need to find another place to stay for the night."

The Beadle smiled again, and Johanna found herself practically gagging. _He looks so much like Judge Turpin when he smiles that way…_

"My dear boy, what did you think I had intended for you? To leave you to fend for yourself on the streets, and then hunt you down in the morning to interrogate you? Nonsense. You and your wife shall stay with me, in my lodgings, as my personal guests. You are both now officially under the watch of Scotland Yard as agents and witnesses. It will be my top priority to provide for you both while you aid in the investigation of this serious matter. Relax, my dear boy…you'll be more than safe with me."

Before they could say another word, two constables seemed to materialize out of nowhere, one on Anthony's side and one on Johanna's. They took the two of them firmly by the arms and guided them to the coach, practically lifting them up and pushing them inside. Johanna seized Anthony once they were in the coach, and the two of them stared out the glass window in stunned shock at Beadle Conner, who smiled and waved as the reigns cracked above them and the coach rattled away. They turned and looked at each other.

"How can he do this, Anthony?" she cried. "How can he make us…"

"It doesn't matter," Anthony replied, his eyes downcast and his voice weak. "It doesn't matter what he does. The only way we'll be able to get to Mr. Todd is if we help him. We have no choice, love."

Johanna looked at him, her wide eyes searching, desperate. But she knew he was right. They had no choice. She turned and peered out of the window, watching the black, charred block of the building on Fleet Street shrink away into the twilight skyline. Her eyes were drawn to the empty dark hole that had once been the front window on the second story….and for just an instant, she saw him, his blood-covered image flashing in her mind's eye, and she heard his voice snarling at her…

_Forget my face…_

She whirled around and buried her face in Anthony's chest. He started a moment, then quickly wrapped his arms around her.

"It's going to be ok, Johanna," he whispered. "I'll take care of you. We'll find Mr. Todd. We'll find him and make sure he's safe, and then we'll make all of the ghosts go away, once and for all. I promise."

0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0

"Oh, God in 'eaven…thank _goodness," _Mrs. Lovett cried, her voice breaking the stilted silence that had followed them all the way from the ancient house in the countryside.

"A town!" cried the boy. "A little village, look!"

"I see it, lad, I see it," she breathed. "We'll be there in no time."

Sweeney closed his eyes. Though he showed no exterior sign of it…he kept his face blank, and he said nothing…he was flooded with relief. It would be dark in a few short hours, and they had been walking through snow-covered country roads for an entire day, stopping only once to rest and eat a few meager scraps of bread and swallow a few burning mouthfuls of gin.

But in truth, it wasn't the exhaustive trudging, or the gnawing hunger, or the dragging weight of the carpetbags that had driven the wearying trek to the point of being nearly unbearable. It had been something else…something silent and invisible that had hung around them like robes of lead since early that morning. It had plagued Sweeney the entire day, whispering, nagging, teasing, blowing into his ear, hanging about his shoulders and tugging at his arms…it had made keeping up his typical facade of glowering indifference almost impossible.

He had forced himself not to look at her. Literally. He had not turned one eye anywhere remotely near her direction since it had happened. Now, as he looked up and saw the dark rooftops of a small, country village appearing over the horizon, he closed his eyes, and to his complete horror her face was the first thing that he saw.

"_I won' let 'im, Mr. T," she whispered. "I won' let 'im._

Her hands, gentle, as cold as ice…

Her lips…she wouldn't pull away…

Sweeney let out a sound that was halfway between a gasp for air and a growl of effort.

He didn't see it, but he felt it as she jerked her head up to look at him.

"Everythin' alright, love?"

He didn't answer. _Damn her. Damn her straight to hell. Her and her damned child…the devil take them both._

"Just 'old on a bit longer, Mr. T. Soon we'll be nice and cozy in a real room, with a real bed and 'ot baths. Good night's sleep'll do us all wonders."

He found himself recounting the events of the day, the long, seemingly endless hours of silent trudging. Why hadn't they spoken? He swore that during the entire walk not one of them had said a single word, not even Mrs. Lovett, who typically wasn't able to keep her mouth shut for thirteen seconds, let alone almost thirteen hours. Normally, this kind of silence wouldn't have bothered him in the least…on the contrary, it would have been a welcome change from her constant prattling. _Why…_why had this silence been so horrible?

The answer, of course, came to him mind almost immediately. He bluntly ignored it and forced it from his thoughts. He told himself the same thing he always did when feelings, when traces of human emotion, began to wheedle their way back into his heart.

_Indifferent. That's all you are. Be indifferent._

He couldn't allow himself to feel. He couldn't allow himself to care. It was the only thing that would save him, the only thing that would keep him from being driven completely mad. It had kept him alive through prison in Australia, through the discovery of his Lucy's death, through the loss of Johanna, through the loss of his purpose in life once the judge was dead. It had kept him alive then. It could keep him sane now.

_Be indifferent._

_You can't go back to that. You can never go back._

_You can never be a father again._

_You can never love again._

At long last they came into the town. It was a tiny place, an insignificant speck on the map, home to a few farmers and country tradesmen, an overflow spot from bustling London. A few open carriages rambled up and down the snow-packed streets; lanterns hanging on rundown storefronts and a few shabby lampposts provided the only light. Here and there wandered a lone pedestrian with their collars turned up and faces turned down. Sweeney surveyed the area with a critical eye, determined to forget everything but their purpose. This, at least, would be a good place to disappear for a while.

His body suddenly went stiff as a board, tension shooting through him and turning his muscles to wood. Her hand was on his arm.

"What you think, Mr. T?" she asked quietly. "This place look safe?"

He was paralyzed. He was furious. Why was this happening to him? She had touched him thousands of times. She wouldn't keep her bloody filthy hands off of him. He had gotten used to it long ago. Why was this happening to him? Why now?

_Her lips against his temple…warm, so warm, when the rest of him was so cold…__so cold, for so many years…_

_BE INDIFFERENT!_

"It will do," he muttered, hoisting a bag higher over his shoulder and walking away. Mrs. Lovett and the boy hurried to follow him. They made their way casually up the street, trying not to make any conspicuous moves. They went until they came to a little three-storied inn…small, and a bit shabby, as was everything in the rural village…but it would serve their purpose nicely. They clambered inside, breath puffing and noses running. Sweeney approached the desk.

"Room for the night, please," he mumbled, just barely meeting the gaze of the stout, middle-aged woman behind the counter.

"Right you are, sir," she said, smiling broadly and bringing out an enormous battered-looking book. She dropped it on the counter, brushing dust off the cover and heaving it open. It was a roster of guests. She carefully dipped a pen in ink and handed it to Sweeney. He took it, holding it over the blank space, and paused, only for an instant. Then he wrote in careful, backward slanted scrawl that was not even remotely resembled his own handwriting; _Nathaniel Copperwait, _the name that now adorned all of his forged documents and legal papers. He signed the book, then took a few coins from his pocket and laid them on the paper. The bubbly hostess smiled as she swept them away and took a key from the wall, handing it to him.

"Room four, Mr. Copperwait, upstairs and just beyond the landing. Washroom is at the end of the hall."

Sweeney turned the key in the rickety old lock at the splintered door of room four. The floorboards creaked as Mrs. Lovett and Toby shifted wearily on their feet. At last the lock clicked open, and the door swung inward. Sweeney stepped inside and let the carpetbags fall to the floor with a deafening _thud, _and the boy and the woman did the same behind him. Then, straightening up and stifling a wince at the aching surge through his back, Sweeney turned…and saw it. Sitting there, in the middle of the room, innocent, quiet, covered with a ragged quilt and propped with an ornately carved wooden headboard. Beside it, on a bedside table, sat a single kerosene lamp that lit the room in a brown half-glow. The bed. The _single _bed.

Mrs. Lovett gave a long, deep sigh of exhaustion, turning and letting herself fall backwards on it. Despite her small, petite frame, the ancient mattress creaked and bounced for almost a full minute as she collapsed on it.

"Oh, that's the ticket," she sighed happily, closing her eyes. "Toby, darling, lay down and rest your bones."

The boy readily obeyed, flopping down beside her and also closing his eyes. "S'wonderful to lie on somethin' soft again, isn't it mum?"

"Yeah," was all Mrs. Lovett answered. Her voice was drowsy and thick…Sweeney sensed that both of them would be asleep within a few minutes, if not less.

_So much the better._

Then, Mrs. Lovett slowly sat up, and to his dismay, turned and looked directly at him.

"What are we goin' to do about the bed, then, love?" she asked.

_BE INDIFFERENT!_

Sweeney swallowed and discovered that his throat was as dry as cotton. He cleared it quietly and narrowed his eyes, turning away to hand his coat on a rack near the door.

"You and the boy take it," he muttered.

"Oh, love," Mrs. Lovett crooned, and he cursed inwardly. There it was…the breathy, sensible voice that meant a compromise was coming. "Now, think carefully. Are ya _sure? _You've got to be bloody exhausted, you carryin' the 'eaviest bags all day and barely eatin' a thing since breakfast. Are you _sure _you don'…."

"Yes," he snapped viciously, whipping his head around and pinning her with a sharp glare. "Take the bed," he snarled.

For a moment, Mrs. Lovett looked hurt. She stared at him a moment, her eyes dewy and her lips minutely parted, and to his complete and utter horror, he found that hewasn't looking away. Why wasn't he looking away? _Look away, damn it!_

But before he could make himself turn around, she did it first. She closed her mouth and went back into motion, slipping her arms out of her coat alaying it on the bed. She stood for a brief moment with her hands on her hips, surveying the room. She ran a hand through her wild hair.

"Well, then, let's see….aaahhh….Toby, you're 'ungry, ain't you?"

"Oh, _yes, _mum. Starvin.'"

"I 'spose we'd best 'ave some supper then. We might better save the bread and things for when we're out and can't get nothin' else, though…." she turned in a slow circle, pacing, thinking.

Sweeney stood like a statue, half looking at her, half staring at the floor. He had never felt anything more unbearable in his life than being trapped in a room with the two of them…with _her…_with the damned memories of the morning and the night before swimming in his head, refusing to dissipate. _Be indifferent. _But the more he told himself that, the harder it seemed to become.…

"Tell you what, boys, I'll take a bit of our money and go out and buy somethin'," Mrs. Lovett said finitely, reaching for her coat once more. "You two jus' sit tight. I'll be back in a jiff."

"No!"

The two of them turned to look at him, and Sweeney realized it was he who had spoken. _Oh, God…_

Mrs. Lovett straightened up, looking weary and irritated. "What then, Mr. Todd? The boy's got to eat, even if _you_ won't."

"I'll go with you," he said quietly. Mrs. Lovett's eyes grew wide, as did the boy's. For what seemed an eternity they both just stared at him.

_Be indifferent. _Sweeney's heart was beating hard against his chest. He forced it to calm. He swallowed again and with great effort drained every trace of emotion from his face, schooling his gaze into a deadpan stare of absolute indifference.

"I can't be here alone with the boy," he said, his voice blank. "If….he…Benjamin…should come…I would overpower him too easily."

Toby grew rigid, then turned and looked questioningly at Mrs. Lovett, but she was keeping her gaze fixed on Sweeney. Slowly, she nodded.

"You're right, love. Toby darlin', stay here and keep the door locked, and you don' answer it for no one, understand?"

"Right, mum."

"Mr. Todd and I'll be back soon. Remember, stay inside. Keep safe, love," she bent over and kissed him. Then, she and Sweeney both donned their coats once again and left.

Sweeney moved as if he were in a trance. He saw his hand turning the key in the lock, closing it tight behind them…he saw his own feet going calmly down the stairs, he saw himself nodding casually to the woman at the desk as they went out the front door….it wasn't until the frigid night air hit him square in the face, making him gasp and breathe in, that he realized what he had done.

It was true. If Benjamin should appear and get it into his head to take the razors from Toby, the boy would have no chance. Not only would he be overpowered within seconds, there was a fair chance he'd get his own throat cut in the process. Benjamin had ceased to be the ghost of a timid, obedient man….no one knew what he was capable of doing now, not even Sweeney.

Yes. That was why. The only reason why.

_Be indifferent._

"Well, let's be off then, shall we?" Mrs. Lovett's cheery voice interrupted his thoughts.

He blinked, glanced at her as briefly as possible, and nodded once. Then, before he could move, she reached out and laced her arms around his, holding tight to him and pushing close against his side. It was as if he'd been stricken with rigor mortis…his entire body felt like it had turned to stone, his feet rooted to the ground. The only thing that moved was the blood, rushing, pumping through his veins and making his heart pound uncontrollably.

_Why, damn it, why?? BE INDIFFERENT!_

"I think I saw a little grocer jus' down the road there, Mr. T," she said, starting them off in the direction she spoke of. Mr. Todd's feet moved liked bricks, his steps slow and stilted. He was suddenly reminded of a day, long ago, when the two of them had walked through the London market together. Then, as now, Mrs. Lovett had kept constant contact with him, a hand on his shoulder, a hand on him back, a hand on his chest…but back then, he'd been able to ignore her as easily as he would ignore a fly landing on his jacket. Why? Why now did her touch cause this to happen to him?

_Her lips…..I won' let 'im, Mr. T……you can never be a father again, never….._

"Mr. Todd," she said suddenly. The word went through him like a jolt of electricity.

"What," he said quietly, staring at the ground as they walked. The arm that she hung on was gradually getting warmer and warmer.

"There' somethin' I been meanin' t'ask you."

He closed his eyes. This was torture. Why, why in God's name had he come with her? He should have let Benjamin slaughter the boy and cut his own throat to ribbons if he liked before exposing himself to this. What was he thinking? What was he trying to prove? He would never love again. Never. His heart had been killed along with Lucy. He was a shell, a ghost, a dead man who could still walk and breathe. No one would ever mean anything to him again. _Especially_ not…

Why was he even thinking this?? _Be indifferent!_

"Well, it's…it's just…." she hesitated.

_Indifference! No matter what she asks, just be indifferent!_

"I don' want to upset you, love," Mrs. Lovett said quietly. "It's just…I 'ave to know."

"What?" he repeated, his teeth clenching with a faint impatience. _Ask the damn question, bitch…_

"What…what was it that made you faint last night, love?"

His heart stopped. He felt like all the air in his lungs had been sucked out, replaced by a vaccuum, a void that threatened to compact all his organs into a single ball. But his face was like stone. He revealed nothing.

A boy, and a woman, standing there, both of them depending on him, relying him…watching him with those eyes, her big, brown, dewy eyes, never flinching, never doubting….dauntless…

And in spite of everything he had let it happen, he had let it happen again. He had let himself become a father and a husband. There was a child and a woman who looked to him for everything, who counted on him to keep them safe. He had let it happen again.

He could never love anyone again. He would never let himself love again. Lucy was dead. Johanna was gone, and feared him like the devil that he was. No one could love him. He could love no one.

"Barker," he muttered quietly. Mrs. Lovett looked at him, concern and a soft, glowing kind of sympathy writ in her features.

"Barker?"

"I don't know," he said.

"What? But you--"

"I _don't know, _I said," he snarled, ending the matter. Mrs. Lovett slowly looked back down to the road. Then, without warning, she said something that made all of his previous freezes and rigid paralyzed moments from her touch and her kiss feel like nothing more than light shudders in a chilly breeze.

"You're all I've got, Mr. Todd," she whispered, their footsteps crunching together in the snow as they continued their way down the dimly lit country street, quaint, rundown shop windows on all sides. "You know that, don' you? You're all I've got."

He didn't speak. He couldn't speak. _Damn that woman. Damn her to hell._

Mrs. Lovett released his arm without looking up at him when they reached the dingy-looking grocery.

"Shame it's so late," she mumbled, more to herself than to him. "Otherwise we could get a few fresh things from the market. Oh, well…"

Her voice trailed off as she stepped away from him, opening the door of the little shop and going inside. Bells jingled. She didn't look at him to follow. He wouldn't have if she did.

Sweeney turned his back to the dimly lit shop window and stood with his hands at his sides, staring across the street at nothing. As he stood there, a light snow began to fall, delicate flakes landing on his shoulders and sticking to his hair and eyelashes. His face stayed chiseled in an indifferent scowl. He forbid himself from so much as flinching back in the direction of the window. A few moments later Mrs. Lovett stepped out, carrying a small burlap sack with her purchases. The bells jingled again, and Sweeney grit his teeth against the sound. How he hated the sound of doorbells; he would hate that sound until the day he died. He remembered a time, almost an eternity ago, when Benjamin Barker had used to love that sound, the sound of customers coming and going from his shop. Ha. _Benjamin Barker. _

"Y'all ready then, dear?" Mrs. Lovett asked. Sweeney responded by turning and walking away. She moved quickly to catch up with him and walk at his right side. To his immense relief he saw that she could no longer clutch onto his arm, since her hands were preoccupied holding the small bag of groceries.

"I got some biscuits, pears, chocolate, an' a few tins of beef. Chocolate's for Toby."

Sweeney didn't so much as grunt in reply. _Go on, _he thought. _Go right ahead talking to yourself._

"Now we've got a moment alone, Mr. Todd, what d'you think our next move should be? I mean, we can' exactly go on like this forever, jumpin' from little town to little town. Where are we goin' to end up? They've got to stop chasin' us sooner or later, don't they? Where can we go where the Beadle won'…"

Suddenly Sweeney stopped dead in his tracks. "Quiet," he said softly.

Mrs. Lovett paused in mid sentence, halting beside him. "Why? What's…"

"_Quiet," _he hissed venomously, holding a hand out in front of her. Silently, cautiously, Sweeneysquinted his eyes down the black alleyway beside them, a long empty stretch running between two buildings. The air was windless and silent. The snowflakes fell slowly and softly. Sweeney narrowed his eyes even further. _Someone was there…._

The next instant the tranquility of the winter evening was ripped apart by a shrill scream from Mrs. Lovett. Sweeney whirled around just in time to see a man seizing her from behind before a curled fist came out of nowhere and punched him straight in the eye. Sweeney fell backwards into the snow, stars twinkling in front of him and an immediate swell of heat and a pulsing throb bulged in his right eye. Ignoring the sweltering pain, he staggered to his feet, peering through his good eye, his breath heaving in and out.

"Easy now, guv'nor," a man in ragged clothes with a week of stubble sneered between his teeth, smiling greasily. "No sudden moves, or it's the ol' _slit slit _for your little lady."

A second man, taller and darker looking, with wild eyes that never stopped moving, was holding Mrs. Lovett with one arm around her neck and a short, ugly blade gleaming against her face. The bag of groceries lay fallen in the snow at her feet.

Sweeney didn't move. He stood like a post with his hands held in front of him. His heart was pounding, and Mrs. Lovett's wide, frightened eyes were burning into him. He forced himself to look away from her face. He turned cautiously to the shorter man, raising his hands higher in a gesture of surrender.

"What do you want?" he asked, training his voice to a calm tone.

"Money. Empty your pockets," the man demanded. Sweeney obediently turned out the pockets of his coat, slowly. He had only a few pence in one of them, and nothing in the other.

"_All _of 'em, inside as well," the man snarled. Sweeney slowly opened his coat and went through every pocket on his body, on his pants, in his vest, in his jacket, but produced nothing more for the men to steal. The short thief spat bitterly as he snatched the few pence from the snow where Sweeney had dropped them.

"Bloody peasants, all of 'em…do the bitch, too, Jack."

Mrs. Lovett stifled a cry as the man with the blade began rifling the pockets of her coat. Sweeney felt a strange kind of pressure rising in his chest; without realizing it, his brows drew tighter and his jaw clenched angrily. Jack snatched the few stray coins she had left from the groceries.

"'Ey, Bill….'ey, take a look at _these!"_

Sweeney's eyes widened as the thief slowly drew his hand from an inner pocket of Mrs. Lovett's coat. They were clutched between in his fingers, shining in the light from the window…three razors, _his _razors. Sweeney stared at them, a paralyzing combination of burning hatred and yearning sorrow warring within him.

"Well, would yeh look at _that!" _Bill cackled, snatching the razors and peering closely at them. "I reckon these is pure silver! Bloody 'ell, what a _find! _Finish 'er off, Jack, Lord knows what other treasure she's got stuffed away!"

With a leering smile on his face, Jack tore open the front of Mrs. Lovett's coat, yanked her scarf away, and gruffly began 'searching' her dress. She gasped audibly and squeezed her eyes shut as he felt about her hips, then her bodice…the pressure built higher and higher, Sweeney felt his breath coming faster and his hands clenching into fists…then, Jack looked up at him, and their eyes met, and the wild-eyed thief smiled wickedly. His hand slipped slowly, deliberately, down the front of Mrs. Lovett's dress and in between her breasts.

A furious snarl, devoid of words…nothing but a primal sound, a raw cry of anger…rent the air, and Jack froze and jerked his head up. Sweeney's chest was heaving, rage pounding in his ears, and he realized it was he who had screamed. And that he was moving forward.

"'EY!" the short man shouted, producing a knife from his own coat and pointing it at Mrs. Lovett's throat. "Stop right there! One more step and I'll gut 'er like a bloody fish, s'help me I will!"

Sweeney stopped, staring, burning. There was nothing he could do. His hands shook, but his eyes were fixed on the two glimmering blades. Mrs. Lovett was watching him, eyes wide, fearful, reaching for him.

"Get out o' there, Jack, she ain't got nothin' else," Bill muttered. Jack reluctantly obeyed, and together they drew the knives away and shoved Mrs. Lovett forward so violently she stumbled and fell. In one motion Sweeney stepped forward and caught her; she fell against him and buried her face in his chest.

"S'long, guv'nor," the two thieves cackled as they turned and bolted into the night. Sweeney watched them run, fighting the urge to go after them…it would do no good if he did. A muffled cry came from beneath his face, and he remember Mrs. Lovett. He looked down at the top of her head…her wild red curls were spraying up just beneath his nose. Her fingers were curled in his clothes, her face hidden. His arms were around her, and she was trembling; her shoulders shook with sobs, and the sounds of her crying were dampened into his chest. For a moment, time seemed to stop. Then, without thinking…without thinking at all…he tightened his arms around her and pulled her closer to him. She pressed harder against him and he allowed his mouth to touch lightly on the top of her head. Neither of them said anything.

For a long time they stood there together, the snow falling around them. The whole world seemed to have fallen asleep, utterly silent…the only sound for miles was Mrs. Lovett's gentle, muffled crying. Finally, after heaven knew how long, she grew still and the cries stopped. Sniffling, she lifted her head from his chest, and Sweeney looked into her face. He didn't know how he felt. Everything felt numb and far away, like he was watching it from above…everything but the warm of her in his arms, the warm against his torso. That feeling was immediate…it filled his entire being. When he spoke, the words sounded far away.

"Are you alright?"

Mrs. Lovett sniffed loudly, dabbing her eyes with her hand. She nodded once.

"Let's go," Sweeney said softly. He let her go, stooped to pick up the nearly forgotten bag of groceries, and they began walking back in the direction of the inn. As they went, Sweeney found his eyes stealing over in Mrs. Lovett's direction, watching her in his periphery. She kept her face down, sniffling and wiping her eyes every few seconds, the other hand clutching her coat and scarf shut tight around her throat. As he looked at her, Sweeney felt a strange sensation creeping into him. It was almost like an itch…it nagged and needled at him, itching somewhere around his shoulder. He looked at her face.

_Indifferent._

She sniffed. A single tear, bright and glistening in the dim lamplight, rolled down her cheek, and she reached up and brushed it away.

_I can't. Not now._

_Not right now._

Sweeney reached out and put his arm around Mrs. Lovett. She started, jerking and looking up at him with questions in her eyes. She opened her mouth, her lips moving to form his name, but no sound came out. Sweeney blinked and looked away from her, but his arm held her close beside him. They walked on. For a long time, neither of them spoke. Soon the quaint, crumbly shape of the little inn came into view at the end of the street. As they moved toward it, Sweeney stared forward, never looking at her…but he could feel her.

"Mrs. Lovett," he said softly.

She didn't speak, but he felt her look up at him.

"I know where we're going to go."

She spoke. "Mr. Todd?"

"We're going to the sea."

Her mouth opened. She stared at him in astonishment. She said nothing. They walked to the inn together, and his arm never left her shoulders. That night, by the light of a single candle, Sweeney sat awake on the floor with his back to the wall, watching them as they slept in the bed. They were curled up together, Toby's head beneath her chin, breathing softly and rhythmically. As close as a mother and her child. Sweeney's eyes were narrowed on her face, just barely visible in the faint candlelight; her closed eyelids, her pale skin, her full lips, dark, thick, like a plum, minutely parted as she breathed in and out, emitting the tiniest snoring sound every few seconds. Mrs. Lovett. His bloody wonder.

As he sat awake, watching her, a different image came to him, formed unbidden in his mind's eye. Long, golden hair…a smile…a laugh…

_Lucy…_

He closed his eyes. He reached for her. She reached back. But the hand she took wasn't his. She reached past him, looked past him, to someone else. She didn't see him anymore. He watched as she reached past him and took the hand of Benjamin Barker. They came together, smiling. Their lips met. Benjamin Barker's lips. He wasn't Barker anymore. He wasn't Benjamin. He was Sweeney Todd. And he was on the outside.

_Lucy…my Lucy…_

But she wasn't. Not anymore.

_Lucy…I'm sorry._

_I tried to be indifferent. I want to be indifferent._

_But I can't. _

_Not anymore._

A/N; Woo! 18 word pages! Hope this chapter was worth the wait…I'll do my best to update soon! Oh, and because there may have been some confusion...yes, Jack and Bill stole the three razors that Mrs. Lovett was carrying. Toby still has the other three.


	14. Chapter 14

_A/N; Chapter 14! Woot! In case there's still any confusion; yes, Jack and Bill took the razors Mrs. Lovett was carrying. That means there are three left. I'm not sure exactly how many Sweeney had in the movie and I'm too lazy to check, so for the purposes of this story, he had six. And now he has three! Read, review, enjoy….all that jazz._

_Disclaimer; I don't own it, you don't own it. I get no money for writing, you get no money for reading. Let's hug._

_Chapter 14_

_The Face of a Barber_

or

_The Face of a Prisoner…In the Darkness_

Nellie's brow knitted in her sleep. She made a soft, closed-mouth moaning noise, and inadvertently put an arm around Toby and pulled him closer to her.

"…_do the bitch, too, Jack."_

_No…not that pocket, anywhere but that pocket…_

"'_Ey, Bill….'ey, take a look at these!"_

_No, not his razors….take whatever you want….not his razors….I saved them, for fifteen years I save them for him…._

_His hand slipping, slowly, deliberately, down the front of her dress…._

_Bastard! Damn you! Do what you want, just don't take his razors!_

_Mr. Todd, screaming…no, snarling…pure hatred….but who was he crying out for? Her? Or his friends?_

_Help me! Sweeney, HELP ME!_

"_I know where we're going to go."_

_What?_

"_We're going to the sea."_

"Eleanor."

_What? The sea?_

"Eleanor."

_Oh, Mr. Todd…_

"Eleanor."

"_Are you alright?"_

_I am…I am, if you'll only hold me…just a bit longer…._

"Eleanor. Wake up."

_Do you mean it, Mr. Todd…can we really…?_

"Eleanor."

_Oh, Sweeney…._

"ELEANOR."

Nellie jumped awake, ripping abruptly out of her dream with jolt of shock as if she'd been splashed with ice water. She blinked, her eyes adjusting in the near perfect darkness. The only light came from a single flickering candlestick sitting somewhere on the floor on the other side of the room. The dim golden glow was just barely bright enough for her to make out the shape of the pale face…his right eye still puffy, swollen, and black from where one of the thieves had punched him…and the dark body sitting in a chair beside the bed at her right side.

"Oh, Mr. Todd," she breathed in relief, holding a hand over her heart. She carefully disentangled herself from Toby and sat up in bed, her wild red tresses falling loosely over her shoulders. One might have thought she'd been given an electric shock, judging by how far out in every direction that frizzy hair was going. Mr. Todd paid no notice, however…he just sat there, back straight in the chair, staring at her.

"What time is it?" Nellie yawned widely. He didn't answer. "What ya doin' awake, love? You ought to be gettin' some good sleep 'fore tomorrow…"

"I need you to tell me something."

Nellie rubbed one eye, stifling another yawn. "What's that?"

"I need you to tell me why she did it."

Nellie froze. As she gradually fazed back into coherence from the abrupt jarring out of her deep sleep, she blinked and concentrated on his voice. _Something was wrong…._

"Why who did what, Mr. T?"

There was a dark, deep silence. She could barely make out his face, but she thought…she thought she just see his eyes closing and his chin lowering.

"My…wife."

Nellie's heart stopped beating, then dropped into her stomach like a stone. _Oh, bloody hell…_

"Why?" Mr. Todd asked, his voice so soft it was nearly a whisper. He kept his face pointed to the floor. "Why did she poison herself?"

Nellie narrowed her eyes, peering as hard as she could through the darkness at Mr. Todd's face. It was no use…she couldn't tell, not in this poor light…

She already knew what he would say. But she had to ask. Nellie closed her eyes lightly, breathing in. Her heart was pounding, the cold fingers of fear and apprehension already stealing their way in. Her hand involuntarily slid beneath her pillow, to rest on the small wooden box inside which Mr. Todd's three remaining razors lay secret, hidden. Her palm pressed against the lid of the box, and she held it there tightly, trying to reassure herself.

_I won' let 'im Mr. T, I promise…_

She took a deep breath, and opened her eyes. He hadn't moved.

"Mr. Todd," she said quietly, bracing herself. "You there, love?"

"You know it's me, Eleanor," he answered, his voice dull, toneless, yet somehow still sorrowful and resigned. Nellie let all of the air out of her lungs. Yes. She'd known.

"Benjamin," she said in solemn recognition.

"I need you to tell me," he repeated, this time lifting his pale, bruised face and looking at her. Nellie's fingers tightened in the blankets and she swallowed. She knew that face…she loved that face…but now, in the dark like that, with the great swollen shiner over his right eye, distorting him…and knowing that at that moment, it wasn't Sweeney Todd looking out at her, but Benjamin, the man who was now out to destroy the one she loved more than anything in the world…it frightened her. The dark eyes watched her, and she was afraid.

_Be strong. It's still him…he's still in there. No matter what happens, he's still in there…somewhere. Be strong for him._

"Love…" she began gently, then cringed at her own mistake. It was so hard to look at him, sitting there, wearing the face she had fallen in love with, and knowing that it wasn't her Mr. Todd she was talking to.

_But then…you knew Benjamin. You loved him too, once._

_Not when he was trying to kill Mr. Todd!_

_He _is _Mr. Todd._

_He can't be, no…can he?_

_He became Mr. Todd. They're not the same man._

_But….weren't they? Once…?_

Nellie closed her eyes and put a hand to her forehead. _Sweeney, Benjamin, Sweeney, Benjamin…_the names seemed to rattle back and forth in her brain, blurring and blending with every pass. How could she love one and not the other? They were the same man, weren't they?

No, of course they weren't the same…but then how…?

She shook her head. It was all just too confusing. She opened her eyes.

"Benjamin," she said. He looked up at her, and she shivered at the touch of his eyes, which looked like nothing but sockets in the harsh shadows, especially his injured right eye. "Benjamin…how much do you remember?"

"Tell me about Lucy," he repeated, ignoring her question.

Nellie shook her head, her mouth set in a calm, but firm line. "No. Not until you answer me."

"Tell me!" he growled softly, and for a split-second, she thought he sounded exactly like Mr. Todd. She blinked…somewhere in her head, another part of the line that separated the two of them was blurred. She sighed in frustration.

"I've told you once already."

"No…you told _him, _didn't you?"

Nellie sighed. "Yes, I suppose I did."

Benjamin turned away. He lifted a hand to his mouth. Nellie narrowed her eyes, squinting futilely in the darkness….

"Oh, for 'eaven's sake," she grumbled, tossing the covers aside and getting out of bed. The wooden floorboards were ice-cold on her bare feet, and they creaked noisily even though she only tip-toed. She crossed the room as silently as possible and stooped to pick up the candle, carrying it back and placing it on the bedside table. She sat back down, quickly drawing the blankets over her freezing feet, and looked back up. Her heart jumped fiercely, and she place a hand over her chest as if to seize hold of it. The light had surprised her…the sudden visibility of Mr. Todd…_Benjamin's…._face made the maddening concept of the stranger beneath his features even more madding. The moment the candlelight began licking over them, Benjamin turned further away from her, putting his back to her completely.

Nellie sighed softly. Everything was just so…._surreal._

"Benjamin," she said gently. He didn't turn, didn't acknowledge her voice.

"Come now, Benjamin, you woke me up so ya could talk t'me, didn' you?"

He kept his back to her.

"_Benjamin," _she hissed quietly between her teeth. It was then that she noticed it; the delicate, minute, almost imperceptible rising and falling of his shoulders. Nellie's brow knit quizzically; slowly, cautiously, she reached out and touched him on the back.

"Benjamin?" she asked, shocked to find how greatly he was actually trembling. "Benjamin Barker?"

He turned around. Nellie's eyes widened. His face was streaked with tears, shining in the glimmering glow of the candle. His face…so lost, so hopeless, so vulnerable…she had seen this expression before, when Benjamin had first started making his little appearances, back in the barber shop. It felt like an eternity ago. For a suspended moment, she could do nothing but watch his tears fall, and through her slowly ebbing fear, she felt a stab of sorrow. Benjamin or Sweeney, Barker or Todd…this was the man she loved. Ever so gradually, she began to draw her hand away from the box of razors that sat hidden beneath her pillow. A small part of her mind stayed with them, marking them, refusing to let him even hint at them…but her hand drew away. Gently, she placed the pad of her thumb beneath his eye…his good eye…and brushed away a line of tears.

"Oh, love," she said softly, forgetting, just for a moment, who she was talking to.

"Eleanor," he said, his voice broken and small. "Please…please, just…just tell me why she did it. Tell me why she…she…" he couldn't go on. She watched as he degenerated into silent sobs, lifting and hand and covering his mouth. He closed his eyes and more tears fell. She felt a blunt stinging sensation beginning to well behind her own eyes, and she knew that she was close to crying herself. Nellie sniffed and swallowed, taking a long, steadying breath.

"It's on'y going to make it 'urt worse if I tell you, Mr. Barker."

"I know. I don't care. I have to know, Eleanor."

Nellie looked off into the darkness beyond the glow of the candle. The nothingness, the emptiness…and then there was something. Shapes, distant shadows of long-suppressed memories…she could see them, moving there in the void of her mind's eye. She saw Lucy, trying to smile through red, blurry eyes and streaming tears as Nellie and Albert were moving their things in. She saw herself, rubbing Lucy gently on the shoulder, comforting her in warm tones, reminding her that it was still her home, even if they were her new landlords. She saw baby Johanna, asleep in a cradle, completely unaware that her father was gone, that he had been cut out of her life forever. She saw Lucy sitting at the window, not asleep, but not truly awake, either, staring through the glass at the grey street below. She saw the judge, pausing outside, peering in through the first floor windows, backing up to the other side of the street and staring up at the window to Lucy's room. She saw him lick his stubbly lips in anticipation. She saw Lucy and Beadle Bamford walking out into the night, heedless of Nellie's pleading and warnings; she saw herself waiting by the fireplace into the wee hours of the morning, biting a thumbnail, ignoring the maddening brushings-off of Albert as he periodically awoke from dozing in his chair. She saw Lucy stumbling in practically at dawn, her face running with tears, her skirts torn to shreds, falling into a cold faint the moment she came into the kitchen. She saw Lucy lying in bed, eyes glazed over, muttering silent incoherencies to herself…she heard poor little Johanna, crying out shrilly from her bed, and going completely unnoticed by her mother. She saw herself going upstairs one morning with a tray of warm breakfast, and dropping it was a shattering crash as she stepped into the room in time to see Lucy sitting up in bed and swallowing the contents of a small green bottle. She saw herself running to the bedside, Lucy's eyes already rolling in her head and a delicate white foam frothing between her lips…she heard herself screaming Albert's name…and always, always somewhere in the distance, she heard Johanna's loud, uninterrupted crying.

"Please, Eleanor," Barkergasped, and without warning he reached out and seized her hand. Nellie jumped from her horrible strain of memories and looked at him, eyes widened in shock.

"Benjamin," she said softly. "I…I told you once…I don' think I could do it again…"

"NO!" he suddenly shouted, his grip tightening fiercely on her hand, trapping her. Nellie's other hand immediately shot behind her and slipped under the pillow to rest on the box of razors. Her heart thumped wildly.

"You told _him!" _Benjamin cried angrily. "That…that _monster! He _knew about her be-before…before _I _did….that _thing, _that…._murderer!"_

Like a match lighting paper, Nellie felt a spark of anger flare up inside of her. Her hand squeezed harder on the box of razors and her eyebrows narrowed menacingly. She sat up straight and stared Benjamin in the eye, and for the first time since he'd awakened her she was able to completely see who she was talking to. She wiped away all traces of Mr. Todd that she saw in his face, and looked only into his eyes…the eyes of Benjamin Barker, and no one else.

"Alright. I'll tell you, _Mr. Barker. _I'll tell you what 'e…what that _thing…_'as to live with every day of 'is life. She was used."

Barker seemed to halt. He blinked and was perfectly still, staring at her.

"What?" he said. His voice was barely audible.

"Used. Attacked. Raped, Benjamin. By Judge Turpin, in 'is 'ome. She went there 'oping to plead with 'im for your freedom, and 'e raped her. She came 'ome torn to pieces and went to bed and never got out again, 'cept to sneak to the apothecary an' buy 'erself some poison. She got 'erself a bottle arsenic and drank it and killed 'erself, Benjamin."

Nellie didn't know what she was doing. She almost felt as if she was watching someone else say these things to him…but it wasn't someone else, it was her. And it felt _good. _Out of nowhere, it had caught ablaze inside of her…a seething, burning hatred, a hatred for this ghost of Benjamin Barker who was causing Mr. Todd so much unnecessary pain. This ghost who refused to leave the past in the past, refused to die and _stay dead. _

_And then he thinks it's his choice…his __**right**__…to kill Mr. Todd? To pass judgment on him?_

She wanted to hurt him. She wanted to _hurt him._

Nellie leaned forward until her face was close with Barker's. She glared at him through livid, cruel, heartless eye, and she pursed her lips and hardened her heart.

"Now you know," she ground through a tight jaw. "Let's see what _you _turn into because of it, _Mr. Barker."_

If he heard her last words, he showed no sign of it. His face was completely blank. Slowly, he released her hand, and she immediately drew it close to her, still piercing him with her hate-filled eyes. Benjamin calmly stood up, pushing the chair away from the bed, and crossed the small room to stand before the single window overlooking the snow-filled streets of the tiny village. He stood with his arms at his sides, the feeble moonlight just barely lighting his white face. Nellie couldn't read his expression from where she sat on the bed, but when he spoke, it was as if his voice painted the image for her. He spoke like a thin wind, toneless, constant, blowing across a barren field.

"I remember you, Eleanor," he said. There was a moment of dead silence. Nellie stared at him, those four words inexplicably melting away her anger.

"I remember you," he continued, never turning to look at her. "You lived with your parents, in the little flat just down the block from us. You sold shoes. Your father was a cobbler. I knew him for some years before he died. I remember…I used to see you, sometimes, sitting out on the steps in front of the shop, polishing shoes. You seemed so young, back then…freckles, and curls, and those big, brown eyes."

Nellie's eyes bored into his vested back. She just sat there, dumbfounded. _What could this mean?_

"Lucy knew you. She mentioned you now and then, said you were a charming, funny little thing. Made her laugh every time she saw you in town or the market. Said you were a bit crass, a bit bawdy at times…but really, a lovely girl, in your own way."

Benjamin turned and looked at her, and his face chilled her to her very soul. It was as if through that one black, swollen eye, a demon was staring out at her.

"I'm not going to try and make you listen to me, Eleanor," Barker said softly, his voice hoarse and gravelly.

Nellie's mouth grew dry, her heart pounding in her ears, hand closing tighter around the box beneath her pillow.

"I don't remember much," he went on, his posture defeated, hopeless, never moving from the window. "Only flashes…glimpses…like a face, in the darkness. I don't know when…or how…it happened. I don't know when…he…came out of me. But I know what he's done. I know what you've done, because of him…_for him._"

The words struck her like icy fingers clenched around her throat. She inadvertently pushed further back against the headboard of the bed, unable to tear her eyes from his face.

"He's evil, Eleanor. His hands are filthy with the blood of countless men. His hands…these…_these hands…" _Barker's voice began to break up with strains of disgust and loathing, and he lifted his hands in front of him, looking down at his own palms as if the mere sight of them made him sick. "He…I…_we…"_

Nellie felt the tears threatening again. She swallowed fearfully as they began welling in the corners of her eyes. Barker looked up at her.

"_We__deserve to die."_

Then something happened. It was like Barker was abruptly knocked unconscious by an invisible blow to the head; he started slightly, and his eyes rolled in his head, and he went completely limp on his feet, his body falling like a rag doll and collapsing on the floor with a shuffling _thump._

Beside her in the bed, Toby stirred.

"Mmm…uh? What's all the noise…?"

Nellie didn't hear him. She was frozen for a split second, immobilized, staring…then she threw the covers away, her feet pounding the floorboards, and in an instant she was at his side.

"Benjamin?? Benjamin Barker?? Sweeney! Mr. Todd!"

He looked as if he'd fallen in a dead faint. His eyes were closed, his face calm.

"Mr. Todd! _Mr. Todd! _Please, _wake up! _Mr. Todd? Are you there, love??"

For a single moment, the only sound was the deafening pulse of her own heartbeat throbbing in her eyes. She leaned forward, lips parted, eyes wet, a hand laying gently on his face…

His eyes shot opened. Nellie gasped and reared back.

Mr. Todd….or Mr. Barker, she had no way of knowing…immediately jerked away from her, rolling to his front and slowly lifting himself to his hands and knees. She could hear his breath rushing in and out between his clenched teeth.

"Mr. Todd?" she asked softly, cautiously moving her hand towards him. Then, suddenly, the close quiet of the stuffy room was pierced with his voice, shouting down at the floorboards as he crouched there, lowering to his elbows so that his face was completely hidden from her.

"DON'T TOUCH HER!"

Nellie cried out in surprise, yanking her hand back and pulling away. Her blood rushed, her chest heaved. Behind her Toby sat up, and she could hear his breath quickening as he realized what was happening.

"DON'T YOU TOUCH HER!…_It's you! You've done this to her!…_I SAID DON'T TOUCH HER!…_All those people…you killed all those people…you turned her into a monster, just like you…little Eleanor…_QUIET!…_NO! I'm not going to let you…QUIET!!…My Lucy…my Lucy is dead…_GET OUT!…_Used…used…the judge…she poisoned herself…_STOP IT!…_I'll kill you! I'll kill us, and rid the world of this…this nightmare!…_Listen to me…_Listen to me…_You listen, I swear to God, if you touch her…_she's dead…poisoned…_LISTEN TO ME! If you so much as lay a hand on her, ever again…_God…please, God, kill me…kill him…let us die…_YOU DO NOT TOUCH HER!…_Lucy…"_

Nellie stared. Toby stared. Mr. Todd's voice was changing back and forth between a low, whimpering cry and a haggard scream, and every time it changed his back arched high and straightened out…he was convulsing, writhing, shouting, his hands clenched into fists…

"Sweeney," Nellie said quietly.

"_You're a monster! I will not share this body with you…._DIE! DIE, DAMN YOU!"

"Sweeney," she said again, shifting forward and moving toward him.

"YOU DO NOT TOUCH HER!…_You've condemned her…she's beyond saving now…she's become just like you…_You died once, Barker…_Lucy…Johanna…oh God…what have I done? I'm a murderer. What have I done?…._YOU DIED! YOU DIED YEARS AGO, ON THAT FILTHY GOD-FORSAKEN ROCK!…_Lucy…I've come home again…_You died! Why won't you STAY DEAD!?"

"_Sweeney," _she said loudly.

He suddenly jerked up, his back straightening, rising to the full height of his knees. He seized Nellie by the shoulders and pulled her toward him…she screamed…his eyes were running with tears, his face twisted into a furious snarl…but beneath it, he was pleading. He shook her back and forth.

"_KILL ME ELEANOR!"_

SMACK.

She slapped him as hard as she could, so hard her palm instantly erupted in radiating waves of red-hot pain. Two tears trickled down from her eyes. Her mouth was open, her breath fast and deep. She stared, terrified, at his face, turned down and to the side, stunned and still, his fingers digging into her shoulders. His eyes closed, and when he spoke, she knew…she knew, just from his voice…that it was Benjamin. But it was Benjamin as he was fading, as he was more and more quickly being pushed back into the darkness once more.

"I'm sorry, Eleanor. I'm sorry I did this to you," he whispered. Then his head fell further, dropping onto his breast, and his fingers loosened their hold on her. He was gone.

Nellie hadn't moved. She hadn't thought. She was still in shock.

"Mr. Todd," she said breathlessly, soundlessly.

He lifted his head…fast. So fast she yelped in surprise. He sat upright and let go of her, looking perfectly calm and wide awake. It was as if for a long moment he had no idea where he was.

"Mrs. Lovett," he said quietly, as recognition visibly fazed into him.

Inwardly, Nellie's heart nearly burst with relief, but on the outside she showed no change.

"It was 'im," she said breathlessly, searching Mr. Todd's face, drinking in the wonderful, wonderful sight of him back in his own mind once more. "It was Barker."

Mr. Todd said nothing. He blinked once, still dazed and disoriented.

"You were talkin' to 'im Mr. T."

He closed his eyes. "…Yes," he said gradually.

Nellie leaned forward, the single lines of tears drying on her cheeks.

"What do we do, Mr. Todd?" she asked, her voice crumbling. "What do we do? 'E could be back…'e could be back anytime."

He opened his eyes.

"Any time…."

Nellie blinked. Everything still felt like it was rushing past her at an unbelievable speed. Barker…Todd…Lucy, Johanna…all of them spun around and around in her head, making her weak and dizzy. She felt forward and let her forehead fall against Mr. Todd's chest. She felt his heartbeat, amazingly slow and steady, pulsing in front of her. She closed her eyes and tried to catch her breath.

"I was so scared, love…"

Then, she felt it…his hand, on the back of her head. For a moment she thought that it wasn't real. For a moment, she wondered if all of it…Barker waking her up, speaking to her, convulsing on the floor, screaming, this hand holding her gently, burying itself in her hair, all of it…wasn't just a dream.

_But no…it was real…my palm stings from slapping him…I can feel his heart, beating, against my head.…his hand….it's so warm. I can feel it. It's real._

He held her head in his hand, held it close over his heart. His body was as still as a statue. But his hand, intentionally, unmistakably, was holding her against him.

"I remember now, Mrs. Lovett. I remember. I have to do it again," he said, and she felt the words vibrating in his chest. She sniffed, her eyes squeezed shut.

"Do what?"

"Kill him."

She opened her eyes. His hand pulled her in closer.

"I killed Barker once. I remember now. I have to kill him again."

A/N; Phew! Chapter 14, everybody. Kind of a Sweeney Todd meets Fight Club meets Gollum kind of thing, huh? Hope this chapter didn't disappoint…reviews make me smile!


	15. Chapter 15

A/N; Chapter 15! Woot. Hope you like it….I stayed up until two thirty finishing this! Warning…there's some pretty gritty stuff in this chapter. Nothing _really _bad, but still…gritty. Just a head's up.

Disclaimer; I don't own Sweeney Todd, and neither do you! Let's hug.

Chapter 15

_Transported for Life_

or

_It's Todd, Now_

They didn't let him say goodbye.

He could have dealt with everything else. He could have managed to keep himself together, somehow…through the arrest, the beatings, the holding, the trial, the sentence, the shackling…everything….if they had only let him say goodbye, just for a moment, he could have dealt with it all.

But they didn't. The last he ever saw of her was a faraway glimpse from across the courtroom, a distant, longing gaze at her despairing face, beautiful and soft even as she wept, with Johanna bundled tightly and cradled against her shoulder. He had stared at them as long as he could, craning his neck around to hold her gaze for as long as possible…just a moment, just a single touch, and he could have stayed in one piece. The last time he would ever see her…and it was from far away across an enormous room, through the grey, dusty sunlight of the city courthouse, as he was led away in shackles.

It happened on the ship. He had held it in for hours; through the whole boarding process, he forced himself to keep silent and straight-faced. First they stripped him of his clothes, splashed a bucket of freezing water on him, tossed white, stinging delousing powder over him, and shoved a grey, folded prison uniform into his hands, the fabric so ratty and threadbare that the stripes were almost indistinguishable. Then he was kept in a holding line, chained together in a long row with dozens of other exile prisoners, for almost three hours while the ship was made ready; the ship that would take them to their new home, a British Australian labor camp. He kept his head down, his eyes glued to the ground, never speaking, never looking, never making eye contact with anyone. He and the other convicts were filed on board like heads of cattle, ushered into the brig where row after row of cells were waiting with open gates. They were pushed in ten or eleven to a cell, the bars were locked behind them, and they were left there, with no light but the dirty glow of a few rusty lanterns swaying from the ceiling. They stumbled and knocked into each other, cursing and grumbling, as the ship rocked and tilted making its way out of the harbor.

He held it in as long as he could. It was maybe two hours after they had left port that he could finally bear it no longer.

He broke down.

The other occupants of his cell all glanced toward him in curiosity when they suddenly heard a loud cry of despair, a miserable, high-pitched wail that came suddenly out of the far corner. He had his back to the grated wall, and was sliding down it slowly until he sat down on the wet, filthy floor. He had his head in his hands, and he was rocking slightly back and forth, taking large, gasping breaths and uttering small cries and whimpers.

A gaunt, half-starved looking prisoner grinned and elbowed another in the ribs.

"Why, ain't that the sweetest thing y'ever seen?" he jeered. "Poor thing misses his mummy."

"Ain't no mummy where we're goin', mate," another laughed, nudging the crying man with his foot.

Barker didn't even hear them. He couldn't hear anything except a finite, wooden bang, striking again and again, repeating and echoing in his mind.

_Bang!_

The sound of Judge Turpin's gavel hitting the high wooden pulpit of the courthouse.

"_Guilty. Get him out of my sight."_

"Lucy…Lucy…"

"Eh, lookee here, gents! Lucy? Oo's that then, eh? Oo's Lucy, poppet?"

Barker didn't even notice the filthy, leering prisoner bending over in front of him, taunting him. He didn't hear or see anyone around him. It was like he was in a fog. His breath came harder and faster and harder and faster, and tears of hysterical panic clouded his eyes.

_This can't be happening. This can't be happening. This can't be happening._

"Ey! You look at me when I'm talkin' to you, boy!"

_This is a nightmare. Tomorrow I'll wake up in bed lying beside her, and Johanna will be crying in the next room, and everything will be just as it was…_

The prisoner growled, picked up his foot, and kicked Benjamin in the mouth.

The rickety iron gates shook and rattled with the force of the impact as Barker's body slammed back into them. Blinding pain seared through him, bright flashes erupting behind his eyes. He slowly slid down against the bars until he lay crumpled on his side, his mouth hanging open, paralyzed in shock and pain. He coughed, spitting blood onto the floor and gagging.

"You listen to me," it was the prisoner, crouching down beside him. He grabbed a handful of Benjamin's hair and lifted his head up, staring him in the face. Barker peered back through squinted eyes, still wrought in frozen, incredulous shock.

"You wanna even _make _it to Australia alive, you'd better watch your step, boy," the man sneered, his hot, rank breath pouring over his face. "This ain't no place for a pretty thing like you. And there ain't no Lucy's skirts to 'ide be'ind, neither. Now you put that curly little 'ead back down, poppet…or I'll put it down _for you."_

He tossed Barker back on the floor like a rag doll and moved away through the dense pack of other prisoners. A few of them cast sympathetic looks in Benjamin's direction; some of them snickered under their breath. The majority turned away fearfully and pretended not to notice.

As the thick, cottony dizziness began to clear from his head, Benjamin slowly picked himself up. He choked, leaning over and coughing up blood. There was a pressing, muted pain on one side of his mouth…he rolled his jaw, lips trembling, and spit out something sharp and solid that made a delicate _plink _against the wood floor. He picked it up and squinted down at it. It was a tooth, one of his front molars.

Benjamin's eyes fluttered haphazardly back in his head. He dropped the tooth and fell back against the bars again; his eyes closed and he fainted quietly.

The prison ship's voyage to Australia took four months. Four long, dark, endless months. For one hundred and twenty three days, Benjamin didn't see the light of day. He and the other prisoners sentenced for life were kept in their galley prison cells round the clock. Twice a day they were given bowls of beige gruel as thick as sweat, and once a day a hunk of bread. Fights often broke out during mealtimes, prisoners shoving and swearing and lashing out at each other; these were always broken up by the guards, but usually not until someone's nose had been bloodied. Benjamin made that far corner of the cell his entire world; day and night he huddled there, his head down and his eyes glued to the floor. Sometimes, most often at night when the other prisoners were asleep…when he was sure there was no one up and willing to bother him…he would walk in small circles around the cell, pacing back and forth, tilting his body in rhythm with the ship's gentle rocking. But most of the time, he stayed crouched in his corner.

His mouth was swollen for two days after being kicked, and the bruises on his face lasted two weeks. The prisoner who had kicked him came to him again after they had been at sea for four days.

"'And ow's Lucy's little lad doin' this mornin', eh?"

Benjamin glanced up, saw who it was, and quickly put his face back down against his knees. He squeezed his eyes shut, as if trying to hide himself in the darkness. He knew he was being a coward. He didn't care. Since leaving Lucy and Johanna behind in that cavernous courtroom, it was almost as if all feeling had drained from his body…after the first night he hadn't even had the energy to cry anymore. He was hollow, empty. The only things that struck an impulse in him now were the daily demands of his body for food and water and sleep, and the only things that spurred him to thought or action were the necessities of survival. He didn't care about being a coward. He curled himself into a ball and waited for it to be over.

"Not too chatty today, are we darlin'?" the prisoner, who's name Barker had overheard was Cecil, muttered over him. Benjamin tried to sink his head further beneath his shoulders. The urge to whimper began wheedling at his chest and throat, but he suppressed it.

"Heh. Guess we won't be hearin' your pretty singin' voice today. Shame." Cecil pushed him over with his foot and walked away.

After about a week, Benjamin had completely lost his sense of time. There were no windows in the galley, and the swinging lanterns perpetually emitted the same level of dank, grimy light, so there was no way to differentiate between daylight and the nighttime. The only way to mark the passage of time at all was the periodical rounds of the guards and the distribution of meals, and even those seemed to all run and blend together after a certain point. Every few days, Cecil would wander over to Benjamin's corner of the cell. Whenever he was bored. Whenever the bruises started to heal over and needed freshening up. No one stopped him. The other prisoners ignored him. The guards never noticed.

Benjamin kept his head down. All thought slipped away from him. There was no memory, no grief, no pining for his lost wife and child. If someone had asked him during those four months, he wouldn't even have been able to remember their names.

There was no heart, no sadness, no thought. There was only survival.

Stepping off of the ship and into the blinding sun was like being reborn; the wind and the sun and the fresh air all rushed at him and hit him like a smack in the face. Benjamin thought his eyes were going to burn clean from their sockets; in the end he closed them altogether and let himself stumble blindly along with the other prisoners as they were herded from the ship, through the docks, and into the prison grounds. He opened his eyes a crack as he felt himself moving through a doorway into the shade of a building; they were in a narrow, stone corridor, lined on either side with prison cells. There was a hanging bench and a privy inside each one; he was led to his, unchained from the line of prisoners, and shoved inside. He stumbled and fell to the floor. In the walls to his left and right were tiny barred windows looking into the cells on either side of him. As he picked himself up from the floor, he heard a sharp whistle and jerked his head toward the sound. Cecil's pale, sickly face, darkened by stubble and his long, stringy hair, was grinning at him through the bars.

"Looks like you and I are goin' t'be neighbors, poppet. You won't have to worry your pretty 'ead about Lucy no more…we'll keep each other _good_ company."

Benjamin's numbness continued for about three days after arriving at the labor camp. He moved through his days like the walking dead…his breakfast was pushed through the slot in his iron cell door in the morning ( more gruel; even thinner and greyer, if possible, than what he had barely been able to survive off of on the boat ), and ten minutes after that his cell was unlocked and he was dragged down the narrow corridor outside to the stone yards, his ankles chained so that he could only take small, staggering steps. He was thrown into the shallow, underground mines, and there he worked alongside dozens of other prisoners from dawn until sundown, chipping away at the stone walls. At the end of the day, he was dragged back along the same route, and thrown back into the same cell. A second bowl of gruel was tossed in after him, and he was locked in. And the whole thing started all over again the next day.

For the first three days, his numbness was what protected him. It kept him from feeling, kept him from thinking. He obediently went through the motions of being a prisoner, and for a little while, it was relatively painless. Then, on the fourth day, it happened; he had no idea what had spurred it, what had implanted her name and her face back into his mind…but it happened. He was in the mines when it came to him; he paused, his pick held motionless above his shoulder, prepared to strike. He stopped, and his eyes glazed out of focus, and all at once there she was, her face to face with him in his mind's eye. Johanna was in her arms, sleeping peacefully. Her grey eyes smiled at him, her soft pink lips closed and calm and beautiful, her yellow hair flowing over her shoulder. His lips moved silently.

_Lucy._

"You there! Get back to work!"

She parted her lips and smiled, laughing lightly. _"Look, Benjamin," _she said, her voice far away and mystical. _"Look how far through Johanna's teeth are."_

_Lucy…my Lucy…._

"I said GET BACK TO WORK!"

_CRACK._

Benjamin crumpled to the ground, screaming out in pain as he was struck with a bone-cracking blow between the shoulder blades. The guard stood over him, glaring, Billy club poised and ready to strike again.

"On your feet!" he barked. Benjamin didn't get up. The wind had been knocked clean from his lungs, and his vision had grown momentarily black. He gasped for breath, crouched on his hands and knees. Around him other prisoners had stopped working and were watching curiously.

"On your _feet, _maggot!" the guard roared. He brought the club down again, in the same place. Benjamin coughed and gasped, his eyes watering. The guard reached down and grabbed him by the neck of his clothes, dragging him to his feet.

"What are you dogs looking at? All of you, get moving!"

The picks and chisels obediently began hammering away at the rocks. Benjamin swayed for an instant on his feet, dizzy and breathless. He squeezed his eyes shut and began working again, blinking and coughing for a few moments more. But it wasn't the crippling pain that was hindering him…it was her face, burned into his mind. That night when he was pushed back in his cell, he fell to his face on the floor and didn't get up, even when the gruel was set in behind him. He lay there on the cold, damp stone, the gentle sounds of his sobbing echoing in the tiny room.

"Aw, what's s'matter there, poppet?" Cecil's voice came up through the barred window. "Still miss ol' Lucy? Tell me, chum, oo is she, anyway? Daughter? Sweet'art? Whore?"

Benjamin lowered his forehead until it touched the ground, his face twisted in grief, tears rolling from his eyes.

"She's…m-my wife," he whispered, wondering if he was saying it to Cecil or himself.

"Ah, the old lady, eh?" Cecil laughed. "Best forget about 'er right now, poppet. Moment a man goes off to the ol' clink, it's first come first served for his little lady."

The words bit and twisted in Benjamin's gut like screws, but he couldn't muster up the will to get angry. He only curled in further on himself, weeping against the stone floor.

"Yessir, reckon she's already 'ad 'erself a coupla good throws since ya been gone. Don't worry, boy, I'm sure she'll find somebody new to settle down with. She'll do jus' fine without ya, no worries there!"

Benjamin sobbed loudly, rolling onto his side and lying in a fetal position. His gruel was stone cold and untouched as the sun rose the next morning.

Days turned into weeks, weeks turned into months, and every day it was the same. Breakfast, work, dinner, sleep. Nothing ever changed. Every night, Benjamin laid awake on his bed or the floor, crying himself softly to sleep. Her face never left his mind, her voice never quieted from his thoughts. He could think of nothing else, and it was killing him on the inside. He developed a constant, dull ache in his chest that never went away; it hung, heavy and constant, like a weight over his stomach, never once lifting.

Once a month…just one day a month…the prisoners were allowed one hour outside in the yard, surrounded on all sides by an enormous stone wall that blocked every bit of the landscape from view. There was no grass, no trees…nothing but pebbles and dirt…but it was the only hour of anything even remotely resembling freedom that they were going to get. But while all the other prisoners were standing and talking, or running laps around the yard, Benjamin sat with his back to the wall, arms over his knees, avoiding eye contact with anyone. Sure enough, they'd not been outside five minutes before Cecil, accompanied by five or six of his 'friends' made their way over to him.

"Afternoon, poppet!" Cecil smiled greasily through his filthy teeth. "Let's 'ave us a game, shall we?"

Two of his crones reached out and grabbed Benjamin's arms, pulling him to his feet. His eyes widened in panic…he immediately turned to try and run, but they gave him no chance. Fists came at him from all sides, feet nailed him in the shins…he was knocked to the ground over and over, and over and over he was dragged to his feet to be knocked down again. Cecil and the other men laughed themselves to tears. By the time they were done, both of Benjamin's eyes were bruised and swollen…blood trickled from his nose and his bottom lip. He lay in the dust, mouth open, gasping for breath. Cecil leaned over him and smiled.

"I _like you, _poppet," he grinned. "I'll be seein' you again…_real soon."_

At the end of the long corridor was a room, a room that all of the prisoners were herded into systematically, once a week…the washroom. They were taken in ten at a time, by their cell rows; they were stripped at the door and pushed into an empty stone room with grates in the floor, where they were splashed with buckets of cold water and given five minutes to scrub themselves with soap before being splashed again and having their clothes thrown back at them. Benjamin always kept his head down, washing as quickly as he could, dreading the few vulnerable moments before he would be let back into the relative safety of his cell.

Inevitably, it happened. One week, as he was furiously scrubbing at his arms with the cheap, ill-smelling soap, Benjamin felt a hot breath on the back of his neck. Before he could even try to move away Cecil had grabbed him in a choke hold, pinning one arm around his neck, cutting off his air. Benjamin's hands flew up, fighting in vain to pry him off…he choked and sputtered, pawing frantically, heart pounding, panic seizing him even as bile threatened to rise in his throat.

"_Where's your Lucy now, poppet?"_ Cecil whispered in his ear.

Benjamin squeezed his eyes shut, waiting…terrified…but then, he heard the raucous shouting of two guards approaching fast, and Cecil suddenly jerked and groaned, his arm slipping away as he fell to the floor, struck unconscious in the back of the head by a club. Benjamin scrambled away, sucking in enormous breaths. He backed all the way to the wall, chest heaving; he watched as the guards dragged Cecil out of the washroom.

Time became an illusion. Days, nights, weeks, months…they stopped existing. There was no time. This hell he had been thrown into was eternal. Nothing started or ended. Day in and day out, he suffered through Cecil's vengeful, inexplicably motivated beatings in silence. One time out of ten the guards stepped in to help him; the other nine times, he was at the prisoners' mercy. Day in and day out, he sweated through his work in the mines, never seeing the sun except for his trips back and forth from the prison building and the quarries, and his once a month excursions in the yard. His skin grew paler and paler as the months passed…dark, perpetual circles grew beneath his eyes. His features, once so often marked with smiles and laughter, became chiseled into a blank, constant stare, an emotionless scowl that never changed or lifted. Lucy's face never left his mind, but her voice in his head began to grow fainter and fainter, and after long enough, it fazed out altogether. Her smile waned further and further until he was left with nothing but the dead, staring image of her face, eyes empty and watching him. And there she stayed, frozen, lifeless, like a statue in his mind's eye.

After one year, Benjamin had stopped crying at night. After two years, he had stopped speaking altogether.

Three years, four months, and seventeen days into his life sentence. That was when it happened.

It hadn't been planned. It was a mistake, a fleeting opportunity that came about once in a lifetime. The guard on duty for the night was drunk, and instead of checking to make sure all of the iron doors were closed properly, he simply rapped on them as he passed, red-faced and bleary eyed; he extinguished the lamps for the night and staggered down the corridor and out the door. It shut loudly behind him, echoing in the cavernous collection of cells; they were alone for the night.

Benjamin was lying on his side on the bed when he heard it; the slow, high-pitched scraping of rusted metal. He didn't move, his blank expression never flickered, but his heart began to pound like a hammer in his chest. The metallic shrieking sounded again, closer, more immediate; he watched, unmoving, as the door to his cell was opened. A dark figure walked in…lanky, slightly hunched, stringy hair hanging over his eyes. Cecil came and stood over him, and for a moment, did nothing but look down at him.

Barker stared back. He didn't move. He wondered if it was a dream or if it could really be happening. He wondered if he cared either way.

After a moment of silence, Cecil spoke, his haggard, oily voice croaking and echoing off the stone.

"What makes you think she loved you?" he whispered.

He reached out and grabbed Benjamin, yanking him out of the bed and onto his feet. The two of them struggled for an instant, grunting, gasping, until Cecil got his hands around Barker's neck and slammed him against the wall. Benjamin winced in pain, the back of his head throbbing, but he made no audible noise.

"You don' cry anymore," Cecil snarled between heavy, panting breaths. "Why's that, Barker? Huh? Why's that? Why don' you squeal for me anymore?"

Barker said nothing. Cecil's hands tightened around his throat, digging into his wind pipe. He swallowed, the air pressing from his lungs…but he made no move to escape. He just stood there, staring into the wild, darting eyes of the lunatic in front of him.

"I know why you're in 'ere, Barker," Cecil whispered crazily. "It ain't for some crime…no, not you…you didn' kill nobody, you didn' rape some girl. No, no…you ain't 'ere 'cause you did somethin.' You 'ere 'cause you didn' do _nothin.'"_

Something stirred deep inside of Benjamin, a spark of heat, a spark of anger, of life, that he hadn't felt in years. He still made no movement, but his eyes slowly began to narrow.

"You're _weak, _Barker. You're a weak, sniveling little worm. That's why you're in 'ere. 'Cause you ain't got the spine to stand up for yourself."

He saw Lucy, degenerating into confused, terrified sobs, clutching Johanna to her, surrounded on all sides by beautiful flowers, watching as he was dragged away from her by the police. His hands clenched slowly into fists.

_You're weak._

_Weak._

_That's why you're here. Not because you did something. Because you did nothing._

_What makes you think she really loved you?_

"You're never gettin out of 'ere, Barker," Cecil sneered, his hands ever-tightening around Benjamin's throat. "You're gonna die 'ere in this God-forsaken shit 'ole, jus' like every one of us."

_Lucy…_

"You want to know somethin', poppet? You want to know why I picked you? Why I like you so much?"

_Lucy…Johanna…I'm sorry…_

Cecil leaned in close, his hot, stinking breath washing over Benjamin's face. He smiled.

"'Cause you'll never fight back," he whispered. "Never. You'll never fight back, because your life ain't got no purpose anymore. _You've _got no purpose, Benjamin Barker."

And then, something moved into his mind. An image, a shape, appeared before him in his head, and it covered up Lucy's face.

_The judge._

_Judge Turpin._

_You've got no purpose, Barker. You'll die here, on this God-forsaken rock._

_You have no purpose._

_You'll die here._

He opened his eyes. Cecil's toothy grin flinched, then began to fade. He mustered the last gasp of air he had left in his lungs, and whispered…

_"I am not Benjamin Barker."_

"Aaauuugghhh!" Cecil groaned, sucking in air, his hands dropping away and his body doubling over as Benjamin brought his knee up, hard, kicking him in the stomach. He didn't even have time to look up before Benjamin had tackled him, pushing him to the stone floor and kneeling over him, fists clenched, air rushing between his clenched teeth. It was all over before he knew what he was doing. His fists made contact again and again, digging, biting, crashing against the soft flesh of Cecil's face. He couldn't hear, he couldn't feel. He could only see, watching himself from somewhere far away, watching himself rain blow after blow on the man below him. His fists were wet; blood was splattering the floor of his cell, drops of it jumping up and hitting him in the face. In the dark, nothing could be seen of Cecil's face but a black, mangled smear. After a few minutes, he was limp. Benjamin stopped punching, his chest heaving, mind racing, heart pounding. After a long moment, he stood up, panting, looking down at the dead body.

It wasn't long before the guards were there. Everything happened in a surreal blur; lights, voices shouting, hands seizing him and holding him down, shackling his wrists behind him. He was put in a brighter room. People came in and out, questioning him. It seemed to go on for hours. His mind moved straight through it without even blinking, and the next thing he knew was that he was back in his cell. The murder was pardoned by the warden as an act of self-defense. The cell next to him was empty now. He sat down with his back against the stone wall. He was back in the same place again. Cecil was dead. But nothing was different. Nothing had changed.

_No. Something had changed._

_You have no purpose, Benjamin Barker._

_No purpose._

Two men had died that night inside the prison walls. Two men had died, but only one of their deaths would ever be known.

In the night, in the darkness, alone, with blood drying on his knuckles, he smiled. It was the first time he had smiled in more than three years.

_Benjamin Barker. Benjamin Barker? No. That man is dead._

_It's Todd, now. Sweeney Todd._

_And he has a purpose._

0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0

Somewhere, faint and far away, a rooster crowed. Sweeney groggily opened his eyes, blinking.

The first traces of morning sunlight were flooding through the window, casting their dingy little room at the inn in a cold, grey-blue light. He blinked several more times, lifting a hand and wiping his face.

He looked down. He was sitting upright in the bed, fully dressed. Mrs. Lovett was fast asleep against him, lying on her side, with one arm over his stomach and her head on his chest. His arm was around her shoulders. Behind her, Toby was curled up beneath the covers.

Sweeney looked at them for a moment, his face blank. He looked at Mrs. Lovett. Her mouth was open, and she was snoring gently. Her cheek was pushed up against his chest. Her hair was even more mussed than usual.

He closed his eyes. The air was freezing cold, but sitting there, settled comfortably beneath her…it was so warm.

"_I have to kill him. I have to kill Barker."_

_I killed him once. I can do it again._

_This is how, Mrs. Lovett. I have to have a purpose. When I have a purpose, my mind can be clear. I can get rid of Barker._

_I have to have a purpose. You. I'm going to take you to the sea. I'm going to get you away from the Beadle, and the law, and all of the ghosts following behind us. I'm going to find a way to save us. To save you._

_Saving you. That's my purpose._

He let his eyelids fall closed again, the warm edges of sleep pulling him back softly into sweet, blissful unconsciousness. Without meaning to…without quite realizing it…he lifted a hand to Mrs. Lovett's head, entwining his fingers deep into her hair, stroking gently. She shifted in her sleep, sighing softly, nuzzling his chest before again becoming still.

_A purpose._

_You'll be my purpose……_

…_.Nellie._

A/N; Chapter 15, ladies and gentlemen. Might have slipped into a little Fight Club there again at the end…oops . What can I say, I loves me some Fight Club! Plus I've always wanted to see Sweeney kill someone in an alternative method…without the razors, I mean. Hope you liked it! Reviews make me smile!


	16. Chapter 16

_A/N; ( gulps, backs into a corner…__MCS, you got some 'splainin to do! ) _Ok, so I admit it's been _forever _since I last updated, and no, this chapter is not super long to make up for it…:( Thank you for being patient, it's just that I've been having a rough time with things lately and unfortunately, fan fiction has not been at the top of my to-do list. I'll do my very best to make sure the next update won't take as long as this one! Thanx to everyone! Hope you enjoy it! ( please don't hurt me!! )

Disclaimer; I don't own Sweeney Todd, and neither do you! Let's make waffles.

Chapter 16

_Exile Again_

or

_You're Warm In My Hand_

Outside the window, a rooster crowed.

Loudly.

Nellie grimaced in her sleep, her brow knitting and her face contorting in irritation.

_Bloody bird…I'll say this for London, we never 'ad to listen to no bloomin' budgies raisin' such a racket at this ungodly hour…._

Nellie groaned sleepily and batted her eyelids. The room was still shadowy and grey, but the morning light had flooded in like a white fog, brightening great square shapes on the walls and the floorboards and illuminated the thick clouds of dust particles hanging suspended in the shafts of sun.

Nellie moved to get up and discovered that her arm was trapped beneath Mr. Todd's torso. She squinted with effort and grogginess, groaning again between closed lips as she managed to slip it free without jostling him too much. She yawned and stretched, wiping her mouth with one hand. She made and face and pulled it away, looking distastefully at her fingers.

_Oh, charming. _She'd drooled in her sleep. Probably left a nice wet mark on Mr. Todd's vest….

At the thought of him, she turned and looked down at her peacefully sleeping barber, and a contented smile tugged the corners of her mouth. You'd never guess he was the same man who'd been writhing on the floor, a war waging between his inner demons, only a few short hours ago. He had slipped further down against the wooden headboard, now slouching in a deep relaxation very foreign to his person. It almost took her a moment to really believe what she was seeing. His eyes were closed gently, his face completely blank, without a single trace of glower or glare to be seen. The dark bruising over his right eye was the only thing that marred his expression of perfect tranquility.

Suddenly, without any prompt at all, Nellie's heart began to beat faster. She breathed in and out shallowly as she looked at him, drank him in, greedily devouring with her eyes every beautiful minutiae of his appearance. She slowly lifted a hand and held it suspended in the air above his face. She longed to touch him, brush back that single white lock of hair that streaked like a bolt of lightning through his dark, wild mane. Her eyes fell again on his face, relaxed, for once, white in the shadowed light of the morning and lined faintly with careworn wrinkles. Her lips parted ever so slightly.

_What could it 'urt?_

'_E's fast asleep, jus' look at 'im…e'd never know…_

_One little kiss…._

She looked over her shoulder at Toby, who was also still sound asleep, snuggled beneath the covers. She quirked one corner of her mouth at the interesting fact that they'd somehow managed to all fit so comfortably into such a small bed. She looked back at Mr. Todd. His chest was rising and falling gently, like the ocean lapping against the shore, and she could hear the faint, shallow sounds of his breathing, like the rushes of a distant breeze.

_Just one little kiss…_

Her gaze never breaking, her heart fluttering wildly, Nellie slowly leaned forward. Her eyes were half-lidded…they gently closed as she drew closer and closer to him. His breath…so warm…

She stopped, no more than an inch remaining between their lips. She opened her eyes. He looked so peaceful.

_No…_she thought, a numb kind of stillness settling over her as she leaned back and sat upright.

_Not now. Not like this._

_Mr. Todd….Sweeney…_

_My love…._

She settled for ever so gently lighting the tips of her fingers at his hairline, stroking so softly he would scarcely feel it even if her were awake.

…_.sleep. For now, just…sleep._

Nellie yawned again, licking her lips once and touching the corner of one eye, blinking. She was getting too bloody old for this life on the lam business.

_Oh, well. 'Spose I'd better get up n' make some tea before…._

"OPEN THIS DOOR, IN THE NAME OF THE LAW!"

Nellie's eyes shot opened and her heart rocketed into her mouth. She jumped as if she'd been shocked, and her pulse immediately jumped into overdrive.

"OPEN THIS DOOR!" the voice shouted again, accompanied by loud, forceful pounding against the ancient wooden door of the room.

For one prolonged, horrible instant, Nellie was completely paralyzed. She sat upright in the bed between Toby and Mr. Todd, her hair falling over her shoulders, her cotton nightgown unbuttoned to her throat, and her eyes wide with terror. She heard more voices outside the door, several men barking orders to each other, and one desperate, frightened female voice she recognized as the hostess from the counter.

"Please, I'll get the spare key!" she was sobbing. "If you'll just give me a moment, I know I can find it, please don't--"

"Stuff the wench!" the first voice snarled, and there was a shrill scream followed by sounds of scuffling and muffled cries. "I SAID OPEN THIS DOOR, IN THE NAME OF SCOTLAND YARD! YOU HAVE UNTIL THE COUNT OF FIVE!"

"_Please!"_

The last desperate cry of the hostess before she was dragged away down the stairs was what broke Nellie out of her frozen trance. Her hands flew to Mr. Todd and seized him, fisting in the front of his clothes as she shook him back and forth.

"ONE!"

"_Wake up, Sweeney!!" _she shrieked, not bothering to keep her voice down.

"TWO!"

The barber's eyes shot open and he uttered a surprised sound halfway between a gasp and a snarl as he was jolted awake. He started so fervently that he rolled to the right and tumbled straight out of the bed, knocking the floor with a loud wooden _BANG. _

"THREE!"

Nellie didn't waste a second.

"_Wake up Toby! Wake up right now!"_

"FOUR!"

Toby cried out as he was jerked from sleep. He shot upright, his brown eyes wide and confused.

"Mum! Wha--what's…?"

"No time! Out of bed! We've got to move, _now!"_

An arm reached up from the floor and grabbed hold of the bed, wrenching up behind it the furious body of Mr. Todd. He glared at her, his expression ripped from the peacefulness of sleep and shooting her a look that could make a piece of paper burst into flames.

"_What in the--"_

"FIVE!"

Before he could finish speaking, it sounded again, and all three of their faces jerked toward the door of the room, the other side of which was began being mercilessly pummeled by several fists.

"WE KNOW YOU'RE IN THERE! I SAID _OPEN THIS BLOODY DOOR!"_

"It's the law! They've found us!" Nellie cried.

Mr. Todd didn't hesitate…not even for an instant. He was on his feet in the blink of an eye and running across the room. He flew at the single window and without a moment's pause unhooked the latch and threw open the glass panes, a burst of freezing winter air rushing into the tiny room. He turned back and cast a burning look at her, and his eyes seemed to drill straight through hers and seize her by the very core.

"_BAGS!" _he roared.

His urgency jolted her into action. She jumped from the bed, her bare feet pounding the floor, and immediately swept everything off of the top of the dresser into the only open bag. They had refrained from unpacking much of anything, but more out of apathy than expectance of anything like this. Nellie silently thanked heaven they had been so lazy.

Without pausing she picked up the heavy carpetbag and heaved it across the room to Mr. Todd, who did not catch it so much as reach under it and propel it forward on its course. The bag sailed out the window, and Nellie's jaw dropped.

"_Mr. Todd!!"_

"_I said BAGS, WOMAN!"_

Her mouth closed like a trap. She was still baffled, but obediently threw the other three bags to him, and each of them were consecutively tossed through the open window like so much rubbish.

Meanwhile, the pounding on the door grew harder and harder…the whole of the tiny room shook with the reverberations, and the voices of the several officers of Scotland Yard shouted louder and more furious. Nellie cast a panicked glance at the door, which was literally shaking on its hinges.

_They'll break in any second…_

"Boy!"

She looked back at him. She blinked. What…?

"BOY!" Mr. Todd snarled, his eyes, black, as hard as diamond, again digging deep inside her and forcing her to obey.

_But…Toby…what is he thinking??_

Nellie's heart was pounding, the blood racing in her ears as she took Toby by the shoulders and pulled him, stammering, across the room. She couldn't suppress it…she screamed in shock and dread when Mr. Todd proceeded to seize the boy by the waist, lifting him up as if her were and rag doll, and turning him around to sit on the ledge of the window with his legs hanging out.

Nellie's eyes grew wide. "_NO!" _she shrieked.

Mr. Todd pushed Toby out the window. The boy uttered a cry of surprise, then disappeared from sight.

Nellie felt as if her heart had stopped. She could only stare at the spot on the ledge where Toby had been, unblinking.

_No…_

For one eternal instant, time seemed to stand still.

Then, before she knew what was happening, she was yanked back to reality by the sound of cracking, splintering wood as the door began to gave way, and out of nowhere she felt firm hands seize her about the waist.

"What 'ave you done!?" she was shrieking, thrashing as Mr. Todd dragged her to the window.

"SHUT UP!"

"Toby!! You've killed 'im! You've…"

"_SHUT UP, WOMAN!"_

Nellie felt her feet lifting off the floor as Mr. Todd hoisted her into his arms, cradling her bridal style. She kicked her feet and squirmed, tears working their way to her eyes.

"Mr. Todd, 'ave ya gone _mad?!"_

He didn't bother to answer her. He sat down on the window ledge, still holding her in his arms, and spun around so that they were facing the great emptiness of the outside air. The last thing Nellie saw was a fleeting glimpse over Mr. Todd's shoulder of the door snapping from it's hinges and falling into the room, followed by a dense, swarming cluster of men in uniforms. Then, all she saw was a speeding view of the outside wall of the inn, racing past them. Her stomach dropped. They were falling. She opened her lungs and screamed, her arms somehow finding their way around Mr. Todd's neck and squeezing tight. They had been on the third story of the building. She squeezed her eyes shut and buried her face in Mr. Todd's shoulder.

_This was it…._

"OOF!"

The two of them both had all the air knocked from them at the same moment as they landed with a cracking, shuffling THUMP on an old, crumbling roof. The shingles beneath them immediately gave way and Nellie screamed again and they slid from the eave, only to land again on another roof, and to slide off again, but more slowly this time. For one last suspended instant they were in freefall…and then, with a great, final, muffled crash, they hit the snow. The cold rushed around them instantly. Nellie gasped, her chest heaving for breath. When she managed to open her eyes and get her bearings, she saw Toby lying in the snow beside them with the carpetbags, scrambling to his feet.

It had happened so fast. Nellie squirmed and fought to find her feet ( which were still bare, and already turning numb from the ice cold of the snow ); Mr. Todd lay beneath her, and as she climbed off of him he shot her a single, piercing scowl before wrestling to his feet. He stood up in front of her, and for a moment they stood, inches apart, staring into each other's faces, she up into his and he down into hers. Their chests heaved and their breath puffed in white clouds between them. Nellie stared, her eyes wide. Mr. Todd opened his mouth to speak, but a loud wooden _CRASH _and the breaking of glass from high above told them that the policemen were now ransacking the room.

"_Move!" _he snarled.

"The bags…we can't possibly--!"

"_Just take the boy and RUN!" _Mr. Todd barked. She didn't hesitate to obey.

"Run, Toby!" she cried, hiking up the hem of her nightdress with one hand and seizing Toby's arm in the other. Together they took off across the deep snow, running as fast as they could without pitching forward. Nellie looked back over her shoulder. Mr. Todd was running fifteen feet behind them, a bag hoisted over each shoulder. The other two lay abandoned at the foot of the wall, beneath the two descending wings of the building whose staircase-like roof pattern had allowed them their escape. Nellie felt like a fool for not trusting Mr. Todd…but then, she hadn't even noticed the shape of the inn when they had come and gone from it last night in the pitch black darkness.

They ran until they reached a patch of dense forest at the very edge of the little country village. There, Nellie grabbed Toby in her arms and pulled him into a thicket, throwing herself down beneath the brush. She held him in her arms and panted, her eyes shut, and he in turn panted with his forehead resting on her chest. Mr. Todd fell in behind them, the bags sliding to the ground as he collapsed on all fours and swallowed enormous gasps of air. For a long moment, they just sat there, breathing.

Finally, when they were capable of moving and speaking again, Mr. Todd staggered up to his feet and cautiously peered through the tangled maze of bare branches that made up the dense shrubbery. The country village sat squat and quiet a little ways off in the distance.

Her heart still pounding, Nellie slowly got to her feet.

"'Ow did they find us?" she whispered. "'Ow did they…?"

"We can't stop here," Mr. Todd cut her off, turning and hoisting the bags over his shoulders again. "They'll be searching these woods in minutes. We've got to keep moving."

Nellie looked at Toby, who stared back at her with frantic, frightened eyes.

"Come on, love," she said, pulling him to his feet, forcing strength into her voice. "Come on…Mr. T's right. We've got to keep movin.'"

"Wait."

She stopped at the abrupt command, watching curiously as Mr. Todd halted as quickly as he had begun to move. She watched him drop the bags once again into the snow and pull one open, rummaging hurriedly through it, growling in frustration, and opening the other. After a moment of searching he pulled them out; two pairs of shoes and socks, hers and Toby's, along with their winter coats.

"Here," he muttered gruffly, tossing Toby's things to him and throwing Nellie's shoes at her feet. "Can't 'have you both freezing to death."

Toby obediently began putting the clothes on, but for a second, Nellie could do nothing except stare. Not at the shoes. At Mr. Todd. Her feet were burning with cold after being submerged so long in the snow. But for a moment, she forgot about the pain. His voice echoed in her mind…something new in it, something she had never heard before. They hadn't even been tender words…just a statement of a fact…..but there had been _something__…._

Finally, reason and practicality snapped their fingers in front of her face, and Nellie blinked, breaking from her reverie and hurriedly pulling her socks and boots onto her feet. In spite of the sharp cold, she felt her face warming as she bent over, rapidly doing the laces.

_She had heard something in those words….she was sure of it…._

"Here."

She paused, her cheeks flushing even further….slowly, she straightened up. She was looking into his face, into his eyes….they weren't glaring, or scolding, or even irritated. They were….she squinted, trying to peer deeper into them….could they….could they really be?

Yes. They were.

He was holding her coat. Gently, calmly, he reached behind her and wrapped it around her shoulders, pulling it closed and fastening the buttons. Nellie stared at him with her lips parted.

His eyes…his hands…his face….

They were something she had never seen, never felt, never imagined before.

They were…_caring._

He finished buttoning the coat and looked into her face, and his black eyes were filled with a warmth and a gentleness she had never seen, had never even dreamed he could possibly hold for her. Her throat worked soundlessly for a moment.

"Mr….Mr. Todd, I…"

He didn't say anything. For what felt like a long moment, they simply looked at each other.

Finally….

"Let's go."

He turned and picked up the bags, setting off through the woods without looking back. Nellie watched him for a moment, frozen in place.

"Mum, hurry! We got to get out of 'ere!"

She blinked. Toby seized hold of her hand and was pulling forward. She hurriedly followed, the two of them picking up speed to match Mr. Todd's brisk, almost jogging walk. The morning sunlight was all around them now, illuminating the snow to a blinding white. Somewhere far, far behind them in the village, a rooster crowed its final note before nestling down in silence for the day.

As they ran, Nellie lifted a hand beneath her buttoned coat and held it over her heart. She had seen it. She was positive. It had only been there a moment, but she was sure she had seen it.

Somewhere, hidden, buried deep inside of him…

_He cares for me. _

_And he knows it._

A/N; Voila! Chapitre Seize! Ok…call me a suck-up, but I've come up with a way to make up for taking so long on the update! Have you ever been reading a fic, and you stop and think, "_Oh, how I wish ( insert character fantasy here ) would happen in this story" _? I know I have. Well, as of now, I'm going to be taking VIEWER REQUESTS! ( yes, I did steal this idea from LazyCatfish27. I stole it like Johnny Depp has stolen the hearts of millions. ) Put a request in your review, and I'll pick one or two that make me smile the most and work them into each upcoming chapter. Obviously, it can't be anything that would jeopardize the plot development…but just something random, like, oh, _I've always wanted to see Sweeney hug a kitten, _or something ( most random thing I could think of ). And I promise the story won't become silly as a result of this. I just really want a challenge! Is this awesome? Am I being a complete jackass for thinking you'd be interested? Either way, REVIEWS MAKE ME SMILE!


	17. Chapter 17

A/N; Woot! Chapter 17! Ok, so to apologize in advance…this is one of those unfortunately necessary, advancing-the-other-side-of-the-plot chapters, so it doesn't have Sweeney in it, and thus, no viewer requests yet, either. But I promise, not only is the next chapter going to have your viewer requests ( two of which fit perfectly with my original plan anyway, btw! ), it is going to absolutely _knock your socks off _( if I don't say so myself ). So in the meantime, I hope this one doesn't disappoint too badly!

Disclaimer; I don't own Sweeney Todd, and neither do you. Let's get yogurt.

Chapter 17

_The Baying of Hounds_

or

_People Who Are Filled With Shit_

Anthony was roused abruptly from sleep by the harsh sound of someone rapping repeatedly at the door to their room. His eyelids flickered, his brow narrowing. He groaned quietly, gently disentangling himself from Johanna, who was fast asleep in his arms, her long golden hair strewn about the pillows in a maze of rippling waves. He sat up, pressing a hand to his forehead as the fierce knocking continued relentlessly. The room was almost pitch black.

_What time is it?_

Anthony staggered to his feet, feeling around in the darkness for the shirt he had lain over the back of a chair last night. At last finding it, he pulled it over his bare chest and rubbed his face with his hand as he moved like a sleepwalker towards the door, his feet padding soundlessly on the lush carpeting of Beadle Conner's guest room. He turned the knob and budged the door open just wide enough to peer out into the hallway.

"Master Hope!"

"Ah!" Anthony couldn't contain a startled gasp as Beadle Conner's face immediately filled his line of vision, the light from a candlestick flash flooding into his pupils and making them dilate so rapidly it was almost painful. He squinted, opened the door a bit wider, stepped into the hallway, and shut it behind him.

"Mr…that is…Beadle Conner, sir….what…?"

"Quickly, my boy, there's not a moment to lose! We've received word of Mr. Todd!"

Anthony's heart leapt into his mouth. He swallowed, his throat dry.

"You have!? What is it? Where is he??"

"We've turned up a witness who testifies that he saw someone matching Mr. Todd's description at the docks at approximately one-thirty in the morning, yesterday. A woman and a child were with him."

Anthony's heart thumped wildly in his chest. _They're alright…thank God…._

"Quickly, get dressed and wake your wife. We have to move, _immediately, _before the trail gets cold."

Anthony started. He was still partially disoriented from being awakened so hastily.

"But, sir…it's the middle of the…what can we do?"

"You must come with us, lad, you are the crucial element to our success!" the Beadle exclaimed incredulously, the light from the candlestick in his hand casting an eerie, almost skeletal shadow over his bared teeth. In spite of the early hour, he was already smartly attired, his long cape flowing to the floor and his leather gloves squealing quietly as he tightened his grip. "It is _you _who must help us in predicting his movements! You told me in explicit terms that you sailed on the ship _Bountiful _with Mr. Todd for several weeks, did you not?"

"Well, yes, but I don't see how…."

"One does not spend weeks on end at sea in the company of a friend without learning _something_ of their habits, Mr. Hope! Now get dressed and pack your things, both of you! The party leaves in five minutes!"

The Beadle reached around Anthony and wrenched open the door, pushing him back in the room and slamming it shut. Anthony stood there a moment, stunned and silent in the darkness. _Predict his movements? _How in God's name did the Beadle expect him to do that?

Five mad and surreal minutes later, after what felt like some kind of horrible nightmare of wild, frenzied activity and confusion, Anthony and Johanna found themselves seated in the back of yet another strange carriage, their few precious belongings stuffed in alongside them and the frightening din of unfamiliar voices clamoring all around them outside. It sounded as if an entire battalion of policemen were being issued for the search party; everywhere could be heard the endless clattering of horse hooves, the rickety groan of carriage wheels, the shouting of uniformed men, the restless, vicious barking of dogs straining at their leashes.

_Dogs?_

"Anthony, what's going on? What does he want from us?" Johanna whispered, her eyes wide and searching. Her yellow hair was thrown into a disheveled knot at the back of her head, her clothes were wrinkled and askew, and dark circles hung heavy and purple beneath her delicate eyes.

They had spent scarcely more than a full day as visitors…no, not visitors…._prisoners _seemed the more appropriate term, though Anthony couldn't honestly give himself one solid reason as to why that was…in Beadle Conner's stately, three-storied abode, but the heavy toll of constant fear and restlessness had already had its way with her. Anthony was beginning to feel more than a bit shaken himself about their sinister situation…but the worst of it was that he could never quite put his finger on exactly what was so perturbing about it. In truth, Beadle Conner had not done anything even remotely aggressive to them. Yes, he had pressured them into joining the investigation, and yes, he had been more than a bit assertive about them sharing his lodgings…but really, all things considered, they had no proof whatsoever that he was up to anything more than what he said. It was not a tangible animal…it was a _presence, _an unseen phenomena of chilled spines and gooseflesh every time the Beadle smiled that certain smile, every time he shifted those noble, well-bred eyes a certain way. A sick kind of anticipation hung in the air about him, almost akin to an acrid, sulfuric odor….a looming expectancy that made one sit with trembling hands and baited breath, always waiting for something truly terrible to happen at any second…though it never did. During their stay at his home, Beadle Conner had entertained them as pleasantly as anyone of his stature could; they'd dined together his exquisite meals, sat together in his warm, richly lit parlor, and been given free reign to wander in and out of his many tasteful rooms just as liberally as they pleased…and yet still, the more time they spent in company with the Beadle and in conjunction with the investigation, the more anxious Anthony became, and the more fearful and wearied Johanna appeared. Just what _did _the Beadle expect them to be able to do? And worse…what would happen to them, should they fail to meet his expectations?

Anthony swallowed thickly, clasping his hand firmly over Johanna's. He opened his mouth to speak, but the instant he did, the carriage door opened and the Beadle climbed inside, stooping to keep his head from striking the mantle. Anthony's mouth closed like a trap, and he shot Johanna a single, silencing glance.

"Very well, then," the Beadle began, breathing heavily as he situated himself in the seat opposite them. "Master Anthony, dear Lady Johanna….your noble services are now to be called upon, to hasten the rescue of our poor Mr. Todd and his unfortunate companions. Anthony, my boy…the letter, if you please."

Anthony blinked. "What?"

"The letter," Beadle Conner repeated, his cool, even demeanor never slipping, even for an instant. "The letter that you received some weeks ago from Mr. Todd. Produce it, if you would be so kind."

Anthony's jaw dropped…he looked at Johanna, and they stared at each other in silent, dawning horror. He looked back at the Beadle, who was watching him with a calm, coy smile, one gloved hand extended patiently in his direction. Anthony's eyes narrowed incredulously.

"You searched our suitcases."

The Beadle's smile broadened imperceptibly. He was struggling to suppress it, but could not keep himself wholly from emanating a glowing, almost tangible wave of confidence and glee.

"Of course, my dear boy. Standard procedure for all persons under police protection in an investigation, I assure you. And particularly for any such persons who find themselves guests in my private residence! You needn't trouble yourselves, nothing was removed or damaged. We did, however, come across the letter that you received from Mr. Todd, and you'll be pleased to know that it shall prove to be the quintessential element in our locating him. I must ask you now to hand it over."

Anthony stared at him. Part of him was seething with anger, and another part was simply flabbergasted.

"_Quickly," _the Beadle said with a slight tightening of his features.

Anthony swallowed, his throat dry. His knuckled were clenched in a combination of rigid hatred and fear.

_I have no choice. We're completely at his mercy here._

Anthony reluctantly reached down into a side pocket of his suitcase, his eyes never leaving Beadle Conner's serenely smiling visage. The man looked like a spider, watching flies being dissolved alive in its web. Anthony suppressed the urge to sneer. He still desperately wanted to find Mr. Todd and at last follow through with his plan to force Johanna's fears into the exorcising daylight of reality…but he was becoming more suspicious of this Beadle Conner with each passing minute. After an agonizingly tense moment of blind searching, his fingers at last came up the worn, sinewy paper of the envelope. He pulled it out of the bag and gingerly held it out, swallowing again as his fingers clenched tight around the letter. The Beadle's gloved hand snaked forward and snatched the piece of paper in one lightning gesture.

"Thank you," he said, altogether too pleasantly. The relaxed smile never once fell from his mustached lips.

Anthony felt Johanna's fingers secretly seeking out his. He found her hand and squeezed it tightly, secretly between them, hidden beneath the fold of her skirt.

The Beadle cast his swift, steely eyes once over the script on the envelope, then lifted his cane and loudly rapped twice on the carriage wall with the amber hilt. The door opened and a constable, who had obviously been standing there waiting for just that instance, saluted.

"Sir," he barked, his voice curt and well-trained. The Beadle handed the letter to him, nodded once, and folded his hands once again over the amber stone. The constable saluted again and promptly closed the door.

"What's going on?" Anthony heard himself suddenly ask, with much more boldness than he really felt. "How is that letter going to help us find Mr. Todd?"

The Beadle did not answer immediately. Something about his disposition had changed with the obtaining of the letter. He no longer looked engagingly up at them with that eerie, permanent smile of gentle encouragement…now, his face was as drawn and blank as a stone gargoyle, and he kept his eyes down and busied himself undoing and refastening his cufflinks, then carefully straightening his sleeves and pulling his gloves tight.

"You would do better to address me as _sir, _Mr. Hope, thank you."

Anthony started. A spark of burning anger flared inside him, and without knowing it he tightened his grip on Johanna's hand.

"What is that letter to be used for, _sir?" _he asked through lightly clenching teeth. The Beadle glanced up, and his expression could not have possibly conveyed a lesser level of interest. He looked into Anthony's eyes the way one regards a crushed bug on the ground…completely devoid of either compassion or longevity.

"Hounds, Mr. Hope," the Beadle said brusquely, surveying his sleeved arms and pronouncing them decent. He folded his hands congenially in his lap and leaned back in the carriage seat.

A lump like a stone immediately grew in Anthony's throat, and perfectly on cue, a dog somewhere outside in the immediate vicinity of the coach barked loudly, finitely, it's deep, savage voice resonating in the air like a bell tolling.

"H-hounds?" Anthony croaked.

"Yes, Mr. Hope, _hounds, dogs, canines. _Marvelous animals, these police bloodhounds. I've heard rumors that the best of them can track a scent three days cold."

"But…" Anthony stammered. "…how…how will they track Mr. Todd by it? _My_ scent is on it, too, and…and the scents of countless other people who touched it through delivery!"

The Beadle chuckled lightly. "True, my boy, it is heavily marked with numerous people's scents….on the _envelope. _Consider, however…how many people have touched the _letter inside? _Only you, and Mr. Todd. An interesting fact that few people ever realize is that the space at the top of the paper of a standard letter, just to the right of the signature, is rarely, if ever, touched by _anything_ but the hand of the writer. Fear not, son, we will have no trouble isolating Mr. Todd's scent for the hounds."

The dogs' barking abruptly silenced and was replaced by short, exciting verbal commands issued from one of the nameless rabble of officers.

"That's it, boy….there you are, there you are, get a good whiff….that's right….the others too, these two and that one….make sure they get it…."

Anthony tore the curtains away from the carriage window and peered out through the blurry glass. He could make out the shapes of at least a dozen policeman, all working together in teams to restrain four massive brown hounds, each of them nearly reaching the waists of the constables. He could hear them through the glass, sniffing, whimpering, chomping their teeth, straining at their leashes. Anthony's blood ran cold as one of them reared back on its hind legs and pointed its head at the sky, emitting a long, ghostly howl of impatient yearning.

"You can't do this!" he whirled around.

"Anthony…" Johanna said quietly, grabbing hold of his arm in a cautionary gesture; but he barely noticed her.

"Calm yourself, son!" the Beadle chided him, removing his hat and placing it on the seat beside him, his every move forever schooled by his insufferable, infuriating patience, his cool reticence to haste and excitement that never lifted. "The dogs are not trained to attack, only to hunt down. They will not harm your Mr. Todd once they find him, I assure you. You have nothing about which to be anxious."

Anthony forced himself to calm down, leaning back in the seat as Johanna laid a hand flat over his chest, as if trying to tamp down the swelling anger threaten to bubble over any second. He noticed with a grimacing mental smirk that the Beadle had referred to him this time as _his _Mr. Todd, not _their _Mr. Todd.

"I do apologize for having you up and about at this unholy hour," the Beadle remarked as casually as if they were on their way to church. "Do feel free to go back to sleep during the journey, as there is no telling how far our runaways may have gotten by now. The dogs will do their work, but it may be quite some time before we have a lengthy enough trail to follow by coach. So for now, please….the two of you relax."

His gentle, oily smile slowly returned, and this time it did not fade away.

It wasn't until nearly seven hours later, when the sun had already peeked over the horizon and bathed the landscape in pale, winter light, that the carriage rolled to an abrupt stop. Anthony and Johanna were jolted sharply forward, each of them waking instantly from their anxious half-sleep. The last several hours were like a surreal daze…they had driven almost constantly, with the shades on the windows drawn the whole while, stopping only twice; once to have food handed in, and another time when the Beadle had listened briefly to the whispered words of a constable and hurriedly stepped outside, shutting the door behind him and leaving Anthony and Johanna alone, perplexed, and angst-ridden for almost twenty minutes before reentering and driving onward. The entire time, the Beadle said not a single word to them.

Anthony had initially made up his mind to stay awake and keep a careful, vigilant watch on the Beadle, but try as he might to keep himself alert, his eyelids had begun to grow heavy after only a few hours, and soon he and Johanna were both drifting off, leaning protectively against each other with their arms laced. Now, the carriage had come to a third and final stop, and the white sunlight of early morning was streaking in thin shafts through the cracks in the curtains. Once again the door opened, and once again a policeman whispered secretively in the Beadle's listening ear. Anthony and Johanna jumped in unison when Beadle Conner emitted a sinister cackle of jubilation and eagerly leapt down from the carriage.

"We have him, children, we have him!" he crowed excitedly, in a voice neither of them had yet heard from him, a voice that made their stomachs shudder. "Come, quickly, come!"

Still shuddering from being addressed by the Beadle as _children, _they stumbled out of the carriage and into the fierce chill of the winter morning, blinking in the harsh light. Johanna clung tightly to Anthony's arm as they were led along by the Beadle and the posse of Scotland Yard down a snow-covered, nearly deserted road in the middle of a small country village that appeared to be built in the middle of nowhere. Tiny rundown shops and houses sat tired and dilapidated on all sides, and Anthony swallowed thickly, his eyes wide and alert, as the party approached the largest structure on the street…a shabby three-storied inn with a splintered sign swinging lightly in the blustery breeze.

"Anthony, do you really think Mr. Todd is here somewhere?" Johanna whispered questioningly.

"I don't know…" he answered truthfully, his gaze falling for the first time on the four enormous hounds, who were circling excitedly in front of the entrance to the inn, panting and jumping and pawing the snowy ground, whining and yipping with impatience. He took a deep breath, then let it out slowly, trying to steady himself.

"…but they must have found _some_thing."

They stopped outside the front door of the building, halting obediently when the constable nearest to them held up a hand. As the dogs were wrangled in and put back on their leashes, Beadle Conner was discussing fervently with the same policeman who had taken the letter from him last night…an enormous, burly, mountain of a man with eyes like a bulldog and a neck as thick as a lamppost. The extent of his intimidating bulk had gone unnoticed in the dark of midnight, but now, in the light of day, he cut one menacing figure indeed. Beadle Conner nodded his head firmly, and the massive officer smiled in reply. Anthony's heart began to pound.

The officer knocked loudly on the door with his massive fist, and the whole party waited with baited breath in the silence that followed. Johanna squeezed Anthony's forearm tightly. A few long, painful moments later, the locks on the door quietly _snicked _open from the inside, and a middle-aged woman's timid face peered out. Her color drained at the sight of a dozen officers and four bloodhounds.

"C-can I help you?"

"Stand aside, miss, there are three fugitives in this building!"

The poor woman's jaw dropped. "Fugitives?? Wha….there are no--"

"Out o' the way!" the officer barked, and pushed her aside as he signaled to the men behind him. The posse sprang into action, shouting to each other as they rushed inside the inn, their heavy footsteps clamoring over the wooden threshold, one of the dogs running in with them. The woman's terrified cries of protest were lost among the thundering invasion.

Anthony and Johanna stood rooted to the spot, able to do nothing except stare helplessly. Only the men with the three dogs and Beadle Conner remained outside with them. The Beadle calmly strode over to stand beside them, facing the building and clasping his cane behind his back.

"Not to worry, Mr. and Mrs. Hope. You'll soon have your Mr. Todd back, safe and sound, and we'll set to work immediately rectifying all these egregious wrongs."

Anthony turned hesitantly to the Beadle. "Sir," he said quietly, afraid to ask, but needing to know; "…what did he mean, _fugitives? _I thought they--"

"Figure of speech, dear boy, nothing more. It rolls much more readily off the experienced tongue than _runaway."_

There was a great crash of breaking glass from inside the inn, along with the shrieks of the innkeeper and the barbarous shouting of several men. The Beadle tsk-tsked.

"Pity. Civilians can be such a hindrance in matters like this. Can never understand that we're here solely for their protection…"

For five more horrible minutes, all Anthony and Johanna could do was stand outside looking at the open doorway and listening to the muffled sounds of furniture smashing and policeman shouting. Then, all at once, the entire battalion poured back out through the door, the burly officer running to Beadle Conner, breathing heavily, his eyes excited and frantic.

"They're gone, sir!" he gasped, panting as beads of sweat formed on his face despite the frigid air.

His words echoed in silence. Even the dogs stopped their whimpering. Anthony's gaze immediately shot to look at the Beadle's face.

Beadle Conner's expression was frozen in place. He blinked once.

"Gone," he said calmly.

"Yes. But the dog circled and bayed right in the room, sir…I'm _positive _they was there, sir, there's no mistakin' it."

"And you searched everything. Every other room in the building."

"Yes sir, weren't nobody there, not even any other guests. 'Cept for the innkeeper, the place is empty."

Beadle Conner slowly, calmly lowered his gaze until his eyes became hidden beneath the brim of his navy blue bowler. Anthony watched him, breath held, heart beating like a drum. That stillness was more sinister than any ejaculation of rage could have been.

"Take everyone and search the entire perimeter of the building. Then take the dogs and search every last inch of this miserable little stain on the map. I want no stone unturned. They were here, and we're going to find out where they went."

The constable nodded, and began to salute. The Beadle's head jerked up, and his teeth were bared in a furious snarl.

"NOW!"

The officer jumped, halting in mid-salute and running back to the party of officers. Anthony and Johanna watched as they dispersed with the dogs, running in both directions around the inn. Anthony tried not to think about what had become of the poor woman inside.

Suddenly, Beadle Conner went rigid as a post, then whirled around to look behind him. Anthony and Johanna instinctively followed his gaze, and saw on the other side of the street a man, stumbling and swaggering along the side of the road, singing cheerily to himself. He was the first person they had seen out and about since they arrived. With a dramatic twirl of his cape, the Beadle spun on his heel and stormed across the road towards the strange man. Johanna and Anthony cast each other fearful glances, and quickly followed along behind him. There was nothing else they could do.

"You there! I order you, halt!" the Beadle snarled, raising a gloved hand and pointing at the man with an accusing finger.

The man jumped in surprise, stumbling and nearly falling down in the snow. His eyes widened and his grimy, stubbly face whitened in shock and fear. Anthony noticed a nearly empty bottle hanging loosely in his grip.

"Why, wha…wha's sa meanin o' _this? _I ain't…_hc…._I ain't….done nuffing wrong…"

"Silence, you drunken fool," the Beadle sneered, raising his cane and striking the man's hand with it, causing him to yelp in pain and drop the bottle.

"'Ey, wha' the bloody 'ell whas 'at for?" he cried, more hurt than angry. "Oo the bloody stinkin' 'ell do you fink you are?"

"I'm the man who's going to splatter your intoxicated brains on the side of that wall if you don't answer every question I ask you, when I ask you."

The drunk man stared, swallowing repeatedly and blinking, his demeanor beginning to sober slightly with fear.

"All…alright, there, guv'nor, I meant no offense…ain't no…_hc…_reason to…._hc…."_

"Shut up," the Beadle said flatly. "Now listen to me. Unless I'm mistaken, which I am not, you've been wandering these streets drinking since yesterday evening, have you not?"

"Well, I…I 'spose I left the pub sometime 'round…oh, midnight, or so, an' I ain't been home, but I…"

"I thought as much," the Beadle cut him off. "Tell me, you piece of refuse…did you see anyone else out on the streets from approximately ten to twelve last night? Anyone?"

The man blinked and swayed on his feet. "Well, o'…_hc…_o' course, they's always a few fo--"

"And did you see a group of three travelers together, a man, a woman, and a child? Did you see anyone carrying luggage, moving quickly, secretly? Answer me!"

"Well now, well now, guv'nor…I don'…I don' reckon's I seen any free tra_hc_lers goin' round nowhere…"

"_Think!" _the Beadle snapped, again raising his cane, this time jabbing the narrow end of it forward until it was nearly level with the man's face. "_Think!"_

"Easy, there, easy!" the man cried. "I ain't done nuffing to you! I didn' see no free groups of anybody, I swear I didn'! Cross me 'art!"

The Beadle sneered furiously, his rage seething beneath his mustache. He lowered his cane.

"You're fortunate I have no time to arrest you for public display of drunkenness," he muttered contemptibly. "Take your filthy self and get out of my sight."

The man swayed again, his eyes squinting in thought…just as the Beadle turned to storm away, he raised a swaggering hand.

"Wait a minnit," he slurred, looking as if he were truly immersed in as deep a thought as he could muster in his current state. "Wait a minnit…I ain't seen no man n' woman' n child…but I seen a man n' 'is lady what I knew ain't from 'round 'ere."

The Beadle stopped, slowly turning back to regard the man. He looked at him for a moment in silence.

"Go on," he said calmly.

"Yeah, yeah…I was jus' out fer a little stroll wiv me mate Bill, n' we came upon 'em comin' out o' the…_hc…_the ol' grocer down the way…strange folks, could tell they was from London, they was so bloody pale…started…er….started gettin' rather nasty to us, they did…"

The Beadle raised an eyebrow suspiciously. "They did."

"Oh, yeah, guv'nor, you should 'ear the rubbish we decent country people got to put up wiv from those city rats….fink they're better n' us, they do. Filled wiv shit, they are, ev'ry las' one of 'em. Yeah, strange-lookin' man n' his cocky little wench. I seen 'em."

"Did you see where they went? Where they were headed?"

"Well, uh….no, sir….you see…you see me n' my mate Bill, we was gettin' sick o' their rubbish n' city talk, so we…we _hc _removed ourselves from the sitch'ation. Didn' want none o' their rubbish."

"So you have no idea if they kept lodgings in this inn last night," the Beadle said blankly.

The man opened his mouth, paused, closed it, and shook his head no.

"So you are of absolutely no value to me."

Opened his mouth, closed it, made a face of regret, shook his head no.

The Beadle sneered. "Go back to your gutter, you disgusting worm." He lifted his cane a final time and jabbed it into the drunk man's chest, pushing him over with a warbling cry. The man fell on his back, and as he did Anthony's eye caught sight of something falling out of his coat pocket and sinking into the snow. It was the briefest glimpse imaginable, but he was certain he had seen it…that familiar shape, that brilliant gleam of the purest silver…

He spoke before he could stop himself.

"Wait!"

His cry was so sudden and unexpected that both Johanna and the Beadle looked at him surprise. Anthony sprang forward and bent down, peering into the snow as the drunk looked up at him in bleary-eyed confusion. Slowly, Anthony reached down and picked it up, lifting it to his eyes and staring at it with parted lips. He would have recognized it anywhere.

It was one of Mr. Todd's razors.

"Give me that!"

It was the Beadle. Before Anthony could even fully register what he was holding, the Beadle snatched it from his fingers and held it under his nose, inspecting it closely. A broad, devastatingly satisfied smile spread across his mouth. His eyes shifted up to leer at Anthony.

"This is one of his, isn't it, boy?"

Anthony stared, his mouth stammering soundlessly. He inwardly cursed himself for being such a fool. Somewhere between the scream of the innocent innkeeper and the crash of shattering glass from inside the building, he had made the subconscious decision that he no longer wanted the Beadle to find Mr. Todd.

Beadle Conner's grin only spread wider. He pushed Anthony out of the way and leaned over the fallen drunk, dangling the beautiful, shining silver razor like a carrot over his face.

"Now I wonder, where would a stinking, putrid degenerate like yourself have picked up such an exquisite instrument as this?"

The man lay on his back like a trapped turtle, his mouth open as if he wanted desperately to justify himself, but no sound coming out.

"I wonder, I wonder…." the Beadle droned pleasantly, straightening up and lifting the razor into the sun. The blinding reflection flashed in Anthony's eyes, and he winched sharply. Beadle Conner delicately stroked his fingers up and down the ornately carved silver handle; with a soft metallic _snick, _he swept the blade open. He made a light tsking sound through his teeth.

"Well, my dear fellow, it is painfully obvious that you are not a member of the tonsorial trade," he observed, a poisonously warm, conversational tone to his voice. "No self-respecting barber would let his tools be so ill-used as this poor thing has been. You've been using it to whittle bits of wood, judging by the number of nicks and scratches in the blade. Pity. I'm certain the man you stole this from would have taken much gentler care of it."

"I didn' steal nuffing!" the man cried, a strain of panic seizing his voice as he continued to lay pathetically on his back in the snow.

"Tell me, sir," the Beadle continued, folding the razor shut and smiling venomously down at him, "Was the man upset when you took this from him? Did he become violent? Did he try to fight you for it?"

"I didn' steal it from a _man_, I--"

"Yes, yes, I'm sure an honest, hardworking individual like yourself saved up his spare wages for months on end so that he could buy a custom-crafted barbering razor of pure chaste silver, _just for the novelty of it_. But let us pretend that you _did steal it, _simply for argument's sake. Would you say that the man you stole it from missed it? If he were to, say, happen across your path again, would he perhaps assault you in an effort to get it back?"

The man blinked, his face paralyzed with fear. "I…I don' know, sir. 'E…'e might…"

"This is quite a valuable item, my good man. I'd be willing to assume that someone in your victim's position…a strange, a drifter, even a fugitive, perhaps…was planning to pawn this for quite a respectable sum of money, to aid in his…" the Beadle chuckled softly, "…._traveling endeavors."_

"Well 'e won' get much for it 'ere," the man grumbled miserably, the slurs of drunkenness still partially liquefying his speech. "I on'y got 'alf a pound each fer the other two…"

"Oh ho ho, the _other two?" _the Beadle exclaimed, laughing gleefully. "So you stole _three _of his razors, then, and decided to sell two for booze money and keep the third as a souvenir! Well, I must say that in this instance I commend your actions, sir, because they are going to help me greatly in a little problem I've been dealing with."

The Beadle reached down and seized the man by the collar, heaving him up with a surprising burst of strength.

"On your feet! What is your name, you miserable worm?"

The man looked down at the ground. "J-Jack, guv'nor. Jack Bonnegen."

"Well, Mr. Bonnegen, you'll be pleased to know that you shan't be walking in the cold anymore this morning. You'll be riding in the nice, warm comfort of a carriage…and after I'm done with you, a paddy wagon."

Jack jerked his head up, his bleary red eyes again wide and fearful.

"You said you weren't goin' t'arrest me!"

"Correction, fool, I said I hadn't the _time _to arrest you. Well, my schedule has just recently been altered for the better, and so, if you please…."

The Beadle raised his hand and signaled across the road to one of the offices who was standing by at the entrance to the inn. He ran over and stood at attention.

"Constable, take this man into custody. He is now an eyewitness and a voluntary agent of our investigation."

"V--voluntary, my ass!" Jack cried indignantly, not even able to put up a fight as the constable obediently seized his hands and shackled his wrists behind him, dragging him away across the street. Anthony and Johanna watched the two of them stagger away, blank looks on their faces, trying desperately to process all of what had just happened. Before anyone could say another word, however, three more policeman came bounding toward them from around the inn. Two of them were carrying something, what appeared to be large, brown carpetbags.

"Beadle Conner!" the first one called, stomping to attention and saluting briefly. "You'll want to see these, sir!"

"What are they?" the Beadle demanded, rapt in attention.

"Carpetbags. Found them in back, at the West side of the building, lying in the snow. There are tracks there, and the dogs have picked up a scent, and the eaves of the roof are damaged. That must be how they escaped, sir."

The Beadle's eyes narrowed as he stared at the bags held in front of him.

"And look at these, sir," the officer continued, reaching into one of the bags and producing a carefully bound bundle of papers. "Documents, sir…legal papers, birth certificates, bank files…all the paperwork for three persons, Nathaniel, Emily, and Christopher Copperwait. _Nathaniel Copperwait _is the name entered for the only guests at the inn last night, sir."

The Beadle smiled. "Hm. How interesting…a man, a woman…and, I believe I'd be rather safe in supposing that the third name belongs to a child."

Anthony's chest seized in fear. _Mr. Todd…Mrs. Lovett…._

"Constable," the Beadle ordered, his voice firm and commanding again, "Reorganize the battalion, and give the dogs a few hours' rest. I want us operating, fresh and ready, by three o'clock this afternoon. I also want you to wire in to London and have another two regiments of Scotland Yard shuttled in to our position immediately. Our heading is due West from the inn. There isn't a house outside of this village for miles…I want you to interview as many of the locals as you can to find out where the nearest place of refuge is. You can start with out friend Mr. Bonnegen, once you've slapped him sober a bit. And take this…it may offer a fresher scent to the dogs. If they can get past Jack Bonnegen's stink, that is," he handed Mr. Todd's razor over to the officer, who saluted and obediently set off to carry out the orders.

Then, the Beadle turned and looked at Anthony and Johanna. Anthony veritably felt himself trembling under the gaze…the Beadle seemed to have forgotten about them completely in the last hour, but now that they were back under his watch, the terror and futility of their helpless position washed over him afresh.

"It seems our poor Mr. Todd has had to contend with a robbery along with his mounting list of troubles, as well," the Beadle clucked sympathetically. "Well, no worries. We'll have him soon enough, and then all will be put to rights. In the meantime…come, I'm sure the both of you are famished and exhausted. I'm afraid we're unlikely to find much in the way of respectable accommodations in this…_charming _little villa…but I do believe the gracious keeper of the inn is wide awake. Let's see if we can't impose just a bit further on her hospitality…shall we?" he smiled suavely and held out his cape, gesturing with his arm to the ransacked inn across the way.

Anthony stared in stunned horror, wondering what possible circumstances of birth and upbringing could have spawned such a creature as Howard Conner.

Once again, however….they had no other choice in the matter.

Anthony wrapped his arm protectively around Johanna's shoulders, and she in turn held onto him for dear life as they walked cautiously past the Beadle, trying not to look into the malicious gleam of his eyes and the grinning complacence of his mouth. He flourished his cape and walked beside them toward the inn.

_Mr. Todd, _Anthony thought desperately, one watchful, fearful eye turned in the Beadle's direction….

_Mr. Todd….wherever you are…..run._

_Run as fast as you can._

A/N; Whew! I know that's a long time to go without any Sweeney/Lovett/Toby action…kudos on getting through all of it. Hope you liked reading it at least as much as I liked writing it. Also, I have no idea if _paddy wagon _is the correct terminology for late 19th century England, but I was too tired after finishing this to check, so if it's wrong, please to excuse. Reviews make me smile...especially reviews NUMBERING IN THE TRIPLE DIGITS! Holy flaming folklore, 105 reviews! You guys are awesome!


	18. Chapter 18

A/N; And here it is…Chapter 18! Woot!! I hope it's every bit as sock-knocking as I promised. My original plan was to go even farther with this chapter than I did, but by the time _twenty word pages _rolled around, I figured I ought to settle with ending it where it was. Suffice it to say I only got three viewer requests in here…I don't want to give anything away, of course, but to those who I picked; you'll know who you are when you see them! ^.^ ( winks ) Enjoy!

Disclaimer; I don't own Sweeney Todd, and neither do you. Let's link arms and do the monkey-walk.

Chapter 18

_Always Had A Fondness for You…_

or

_His Woman, and His Child_

They had been running a little less than three hours when Sweeney suddenly realized something.

_Shit._

He skidded to a halt, nearly tripping over his own feet in the twelve-inch deep, thickly crusted snow. The carpetbags fell from his shoulders like so much dead weight. Behind him, Toby and Mrs. Lovett slowed to a stop, both of them breathing heavy and leaning over with their hands on their knees. He glanced up at them only for an instant, and narrowed his eyes in irritation when he saw the pained looks on both their faces. Mrs. Lovett's eyes were shut tightly and her mouth hung open, wincing as she sucked in enormous gasps of air.

_Damn fools, slowing us down…._

For some reason, his eyes levitated a moment longer than necessary on Mrs. Lovett's faced. Her cheeks were flushed livid pink in spite of the cold, and the tip of her nose was red. Her hair, which was still down from the night before, splayed around her head like a great frizzy bush of auburn and copper. His eyes narrowed in on her mouth.

_She shouldn't be breathing that hard…._

Something warm and unwelcome suddenly began playing around the edges of his stomach, and he shook himself and clenched his teeth. He didn't have time for this. Remembering what he had stopped to do in the first place, Sweeney seized one of the carpetbags and viciously pulled it open, rummaging through it's contents while struggling to suppress a frantic swell of desperation growing inside him. The first carpetbag contained nothing but clothes and a few random odds and ends.

_Shit….._

He abandoned the first bag and turned just as fervently on the second…but for just an instant, his hand hesitated over the clasp, frozen…not quite trembling, but tense and taut, as if he had to will himself to move it.

It had been years…many, many years….since Sweeney had last prayed, since he had done or said anything that even _remotely _resembled the utterance of a call to some higher power. But as he kneeled there, freezing in the snow, lost in some thicketed forest in Lord only knew what part of the English countryside….he came close. He came damn close.

_Please….please let it be there…._

He opened the bag. He pulled frantically through it's contents. He found bread, cheese, bottles of gin, blankets, more clothes, some matches, and their kerosene lantern which was now empty of kerosene. He stopped looking and became as still as a statue. He closed his eyes. When he opened them, his face twisted into a furious grimace, and could maintain his spell of determined silence, which he had kept up with rigid strictness since leaving the inn, no longer.

"_FUCK!" _he snarled, loudly enough that a cluster of sparrows twittered in surprise and fled fearfully from a nearby bush.

Mrs. Lovett looked up, still struggling to catch her breath.

"What….what is it, love?" she gasped.

"The papers," Sweeney grit through clenched teeth, his hand fisting in the fabric of the carpetbag and mangling it in futile frustration. "Our papers were in one of the other bags."

_Damn it damn it damn it DAMN IT! _How could he have been such an _idiot?? _They were relying on those forged papers for _everything. _Identities, alibis, legitimacy…all of it gone with one foolish mistake. They were now officially outsiders, runaways, ghosts without names. They had not an ounce of credibility left to them anywhere.

"Easy, love," Mrs. Lovett pleaded in a cautious, calming tone. "It'll be alright, we…we just 'ave to keep our 'eads."

He looked incredulously at her out of the corner of his eyes, and he nearly saw red. _'Keep their heads?' Did the woman not understand?_ For a split second, he was suddenly overcome by the dark, animalistic desire to smack her. He had never laid hands on a woman in his life, and he was not about to start now, especially in an instance where almost all of his anger was directed at himself for his own stupidity…but still…for one horrible burning instant, he could not deny to himself that the rage seething beneath his skin was screaming for him to reach out and strike that imbecilic look of attempting reassurance right off her wide-eyed face. Instead, he closed his eyes, forcing the impulse to die down. It wasn't as if that would do their situation one damn bit of good, anyway….

"Come on," he growled, standing up and seizing the carpetbags yet again. How he was growing to despise those wretched bags…

"Mr. T, wait for us!" Mrs. Lovett cried exasperatedly, she and Toby scrambling to catch up with him. He moved at the fastest walking pace he was able, taking long, direct strides, carefully weaving between the skinny trees surrounding them in every direction. The sun filtered in bright, golden yellow rays, casting short shadows through the sparse, leafless forestry. Farther ahead, the terrain sloped gradually downward into a shallow valley that lay spread out in front of them. At the bottom of it ran the dark, narrow, snaking line of a small river. If he had to guess, he would say it was around ten o'clock in the morning. As he moved swiftly through the trees and snow, Sweeney's mind worked furiously.

_How had they been found? How could the Beadle possibly have tracked them straight to that rundown inn in the middle of nowhere?_

_Was he trailing them at that very instant? How close behind them was he? Did they dare to stop, even for a moment? They couldn't just keep running like this forever…._

Mrs. Lovett and Toby finally caught up with him, one on either side. He kept his gaze firmly forward, refusing to glance at either of them.

"Well," Mrs. Lovett puffed between breaths as she drew up next to him, an element of grim humor to her voice, "I 'spose it's safe t'assume they know we're alive, ain't it?"

Sweeney narrowed his eyes, ignoring her. To be absolutely truthful, those few seconds of his primal urge to hit hurt had…well…disturbed him. He had never felt remorse for killing someone…never. He never had even the slightest qualm, the merest regret, about slicing a throat and watching in dull apathy as the crimson life splattered the walls and drained out before his eyes. But hitting someone, hitting a woman….

…_no, not just some woman….__**his **__woman…Mrs. Lovett….his purpose, the pursuit of whose wellbeing was currently the only thing keeping him from falling into the abyss of complete and utter madness…._

For the first time in a long, long time…almost longer than he could remember….Sweeney was ashamed of himself.

"Mr. T?"

The sound of her voice speaking his name struck a pulsing chord within him that he tried desperately not to notice. For no particular reason, he felt his ears getting warm.

_Just my imagination….they're numb, is all…._

"Mr. T…'ow _do_ you think the Beadle found us?" Mrs. Lovett asked. Gone was the half-hearted cheeriness, the attempt at joking. He could feel her eyes on the side of his face as they walked, her deep brown orbs pressing earnestly and seriously almost like two fingertips on his skin.

In a low, quiet voice, he answered, "I don't know."

To his relief, she looked away from him. An intruding image suddenly sprang to his mind out of nowhere, an imagined scene of his hand reaching out and slapping her across the face. Sweeney shuddered, and almost felt his stomach turn. God…he had really wanted to do that, hadn't he?

He didn't know what perturbed him more…the guilt, or the fact that the object of his guilt was Mrs. Lovett, a woman whom he'd spent nearly the last year of his life convincing himself he could not possibly care less about. For a moment, his old mantra threatened to resurface….

_Be indifferent._

_Indifferent? Ha. As if you could even pretend at this point…_

No. He did not want to think about this. He could not let himself be distracted. They had to put as much distance between them and the village as was humanly possible before sundown, or they were already as good as found.

"I'll say this for Beadle Conner," Nellie muttered darkly beneath her breath. "'E may be the slimy, pryin' little whelp of a whore…but 'e must 'ave a nose like a ruddy blood'ound to 'ave followed us all the way out 'ere. Persistent piece of…."

But before she could finish saying of what Beadle Conner was a persistent piece, Sweeney had stopped dead in his tracks. His face was blank, his wide eyes staring at her in disbelief. Mrs. Lovett and Toby noticed him and stopped, looking back. They cast curious glances at each other before looking at him again, question marks in their eyes.

"Mr. T? What is it now?"

He just stared at her, his lips parting minutely with his sheer incredulity.

_Of course. That was it. How in the world hadn't he thought of it before?_

"Mr. T? Y'alright?"

He didn't know what he was doing. It was as if his body was moving involuntarily on it's own; he felt the weight of the carpetbags pressing down on his shoulders, heard the crunch of the snow beneath his feet as he took the few short steps toward her and closed the gap between them. He saw her eyes widen and her eyebrows raise in an expression of absolute confusion. He saw Toby in the corner of his eye bending around to watch them with equal if not greater confusion. He was close enough to feel her breath, hot and deep, brushing against his face and warming his numb skin. He was aware of everything, everything he was doing, and yet somehow, he didn't care. Gone were the shackles of his old solitude, his reticence, his brooding, his absolute refusal to let himself so much as touch another human being…let alone a _woman…_with any feeling other that resentment. All of it was gone, and he simply stood there, looking down at her, his face calm in baffled amazement.

Mrs. Lovett had never looked more lost. "M-Mr. Todd?" she squeaked.

A bright flush of pink was growing on her pale cheeks. The tip of her nose was as red as a berry. Her full lips almost appeared to be trembling with the closeness of their proximity, and her swimming brown eyes were so wide and deep he felt as if he was falling forward into them. For the first time since he'd known her, he made not the slightest attempt to lie to himself as he looked into her face.

_She really is beautiful._

"Mr. Todd, we can't stop fo---"

His lips pressed over hers and cut off the words. He let his eyes fall closed. He felt nothing…nothing…apart from the warm softness of her mouth. It was not a passionate kiss. It was not even a romantic kiss. It did not last. He did not even put down the carpetbags. It was a spontaneous explosion of impulse, a riot of sensation, a shooting star burning sporadically in the night for a single precious instant before vanishing completely. It was brief, but forceful. He pushed hard against her for a few short seconds, then ended it. Their lips actually made a gentle, cheerful _smack _sound as they pulled apart. Sweeney opened his eyes. He felt detached from his body. He wasn't sure if it had truly just happened or if it had been some preposterous, fleeting delusion.

Mrs. Lovett's very real expression of absolute bafflement settled the question. Her mouth was hanging open, her bottom lip moving continually as if she wanted to speak, but no sound came out. For an eternal instant, they just looked at each other, faces hovering inches apart.

When Sweeney finally spoke, his voice was perfectly even.

"Mrs. Lovett. You're brilliant."

She said nothing. Her stunned expression didn't even flicker.

"Of course," Sweeney went on, now rambling more to himself than anyone else. "That's how he found us…_hounds, _blood_hounds. _I don't know how he did it, but he must have found something for them to track us by…." Sweeney's mind raced, bounding and leaping over enormous distances in the blink of an eye. He looked up sharply, his eyes narrowed and his face chiseling back into the determined, purposeful glare to which he was so familiar.

"Move," he commanded firmly. "I know where we're going."

Neither of them moved. Mrs. Lovett hadn't so much as blinked. She continued to stare at him with her mouth open, her cheeks flushed, curling, unkempt tendrils of hair falling around her face. She didn't even look as if she was breathing. Sweeney shot her an intimidating glare.

"I said _move!" _he snapped, in his biting voice that had never yet failed to spur her into action. She didn't so much as flinch.

Growling exasperatedly, he turned to Toby, who had also been watching him wide-eyed and open-mouthed, but in a very different sort of way. Without saying a word he shifted the lighter of the two bags off of his shoulder and thrust it into Toby's arms. The boy's small, scrawny body jolted with the impact, but he recovered quickly, shaking from his stunned reverie and grabbing the bag with both arms before it fell. Sweeney turned, and with his free hand he reached out and seized Mrs. Lovett by the wrist, pulling her firmly forward.

"Let's _go!" _he ordered. Mrs. Lovett allowed herself to be pulled behind him like a sleepwalker. She didn't speak, she didn't pull away from his grasp; she followed him with dazed, trotting steps, at last picking up speed and jogging alongside him and Toby. It was a surreal, suspended stretch as the three of them ran together through the woods, none of them saying anything. Sweeney gave not so much as a backward glance in his mind to what he had just done…his thoughts were far ahead of them, at the bottom of the valley they were swiftly approaching.

They at last broke free of the line of trees and were running in wide, open space. Here the snow had been blown in great wafting drifts, rising in dune-like peeks in some places and dipping to only a few inches' depth in others, allowing them to move much faster if they ran in strategic patterns. Within ten minutes they had reached the small river running through the countryside; in truth, it was little more than a moderately substantial creek, but it would serve their purposes nonetheless. Sweeney felt his chest unclench with tremendous relief when he saw that the water was not completely frozen; paper-thin sheets of ice clung to the banks on either side, but straight down the center there was streak of running water two feet deep.

"Follow me, both of you," Sweeney barked, not stopping to turn and look at them before jumping off the bank and plunging straight up to his knees in the river. He could not suppress a sharp, gasping intake of air as the ice-cold water soaked through his clothes, shocking the skin of his knees. Thank God Mrs. Lovett and the boy's boots were slightly higher than his…

The two of them paused, only briefly, and Toby cast a questioning look up at Mrs. Lovett, and he too could not resist glancing at her. To his imminent relief, she seemed to have at last shaken from her stunned torpor and was looking down at the water with firm, tight lips and determined eyes. When she spoke, however, her voice still trembled hollowly, as if she were recovering from a severe incident of shock.

"Right then, Toby, in you get. You go first, I'll follow and keep you steady from be'ind."

"But, Mum, why're we…."

"It's so the dogs won' be able to find our scent, love. Oldest trick in the book, but it gets the job done."

Reluctantly, but obediently, Toby gripped the carpetbag for dear life as he slipped down the short bank, gasping and squeaking slightly when he sunk into the water. Mrs. Lovett kept a hand on his shoulder, holding him steady, and she too stepped from the shore into the frigid creek, shuddering with the cold. Sweeney narrowed his brow at both of them and nodded firmly, and they each nodded in return.

"Follow me," he said lowly.

The next two hours were perhaps the most miserable they had yet spent since their mad escape from London more than two days ago. The wide, but shallow river remained mercifully at a consistent depth from where they had started, but the going was slow and agonizing. The water was absolutely frigid, and in some places the thin sheets of ice had closed the gap across their path and needed to be smashed through with the heel of Sweeney's boot before they could go on. The bed of the river was rocky and uneven, and careful attention to one's footing was required in order to maintain one's haphazard balance. The trickling, chattering, gushing noises of running water rushed all around them, making pointless any attempt at speech…and so for what seemed an endless stretch of weary, toiling progress, they said nothing to each other. Even Toby and Mrs. Lovett were silent, concentrating all their strength into taking that next painful step forward. Sweeney was determined to travel as far as possible through the water so as to obliterate any chance of the dogs picking up their scent again. Better still, the river ran from west to east, and they were following it around a great curving bend in the easterly direction, backtracking slightly to the north of where they had already gone. With luck, that would help to confuse the hounds even further.

Sweeney kept his eyes forward and his jaw set as they made their way down the river. He didn't think, didn't feel…he just kept driving himself forward with his purpose. He repeated it to himself over and over, his new mantra, the new driving force in his life…

_I'm going to save us._

_I'm going to save…_

…_her._

Once every fifteen minutes or so, he let himself glance back at Mrs. Lovett and the boy to make sure they were still following him. They were managing to keep close to his pace, but as the minutes wore into hours he could see the slips and stumbles of fatigue dragging them down.

_Just a bit further….just a bit further…._

Then, two full hours after they had stepped into the freezing river, it happened.

He had just glanced back to check on them an instant ago. He had _just _glanced back, and they had seemed fine. Then, he heard it. The piercing crack of breaking ice and the noisy, jumbling _SPLASH…._

"_MUM!" _Toby screamed.

Sweeney whipped around and saw….Toby.

Just Toby.

His heart disappeared. For a single instant, it truly felt as if the organ had vanished completely, and chest was empty….a cavern, a hollow place inside of him. Then, all at once, it returned, pounding more fiercely than he had ever felt it pound. The babbling sounds of the water faded into total silence…he could hear nothing but the panting of his own breath and the thundering of his own heart.

"_Where is she??" _he shouted. Toby looked back at him, his face wrought with panic.

"She fell! She fell under the water!"

Sweeney suddenly felt as if he spontaneously lost thirty pounds; he realized momentarily that that was because he'd dropped the carpetbag and was running…or at any rate, moving as swiftly as he possibly could through the rushing water without tumbling forward….past Toby towards the place where Mrs. Lovett had been seconds before. The water sloshed violently as his feet thundered through it; he spotted her almost immediately, bobbing to the surface a distance off to his right…her eyes were closed, her face blank, her red hair floating around her head as she drifted limply in the current. She had veered just slightly away from their course and stepped into a hidden drop off, sinking beneath the water before any of them knew what had happened.

Toby was behind him, screaming. "She hit 'er 'ead! There, Mr. Todd, _she's bleeding!"_

Sweeney heard him, but the words barely registered, because as he heard them he was already divining headfirst into the black, deep, rushing water. The instant his body was submerged, the true temperature of the water hit him like a thousand tingling knives, biting and stinging and burning at his skin. He bobbed to the surface, spluttering, and managed to keep his head above water as he swam furiously towards her. He reached out and caught hold of her arm, pulling her towards him through the water. As she drew near he saw that she was unconscious, most likely due to the short, but deep-looking gash at the top of her forehead, around which a bruise was already beginning to swell. She must have stricken and sliced her head on some corner of the ice when she'd fallen.

Forcing himself to take calm, regulated breaths and keep both their heads above the surface, Sweeney secured one arm around Mrs. Lovett and used the other to stroke, churning his feet in the water and slowly bringing them back to the shallow bank of the river. His heart felt as if it were going to burst, his entire body screaming in agony as the cold ached his muscles and seared his skin like fire. He cast a desperate, furtive glance at Mrs. Lovett, who was limp in his arm, her eyes closed and her head hanging loosely. As he looked at her, he realized that he was almost praying again.

_Mrs. Lovett…Mrs. Lovett…._

…_Nellie…._

…_.please….._

At last, they finally reached the rise in the river bottom. The toe of Sweeney's foot caught the underwater shelf, and he heaved them up onto it, shuddering at they staggered once again into the knee-deep water. It was ludicrous, but the freezing winter air felt like a warm relief against his soaked body after the agony of the river. He immediately hooked one arm beneath Mrs. Lovett's limp knees and hoisted her body out of the water, groaning and crying out with the effort of lifting her, the added weight of the liquid saturating her clothes hanging off her small, frail figure like so much baggage.

"Get to the shore, Toby!" he gasped, struggling to stay standing as he clutched Mrs. Lovett as close to him as he could. Toby stood frozen for a moment, staring in horror at the unconscious body of his adopted mother…then jerked and turned around, hurrying to clamber up the bank onto dry land. Sweeney followed, every trudging step feeling as if it might be his last before his strength finally gave out.

Once they were on the shore, Sweeney grunted and collapsed to his knees in the snow, gently letting Mrs. Lovett fall to rest across his lap. Her head hung limply backwards over his arm, her parted lips and closed eyes pointed up to the sky. Crimson blood, the color shockingly stark against her pale skin, was trickling down her face in watery lines, running over her cheek bone just in front of her ear. The cut was bleeding thickly, and the impact of it was most likely what had knocked her unconscious…but upon peering closer at it, Sweeney could see that it was fairly superficial and did not pose any immediate seriousness. He did know more than his fair share about skin lacerations, after all, and a quick glance told him the bleeding should stop soon. No, his far greater apprehensions were in concern to the cold…her lips were tinged with blue and her skin was as white as death. It would be a miracle if she didn't already have hypothermia.

_Hypothermia….hell, she isn't even moving!_

His chest heaved, his eyes narrowed in fear and panic. He shook his head slightly as he looked at her, his head spinning, refusing to believe….

_No…no…_

_NO, DAMN IT, NO!_

"Mr. Todd." It was Toby, his voice failing as the tears began to audibly overtake him. "Is she… ok?…she's not…?"

Sweeney lowered his head until his ear hovered just millimeters above Mrs. Lovett's open lips. He squeezed his eyes shut and listened, holding his breath, waiting…

_There…it was faint, but he could hear it…_

"It's alright, Toby," he said quietly, his voice flat and toneless in contrast to the enormous, unbelievable torrent of relief bursting inside of him. "She's breathing."

"We've got to get 'er out o' the cold somehow," Toby cried. "We got to find someplace to take 'er!"

"Calm down," he ordered softly, the hollow feeling returning once more to his chest. His whole body was trembling violently, but somehow, he didn't feel as if it was from the cold. He swallowed, wet his lips, and took a deep breath. Mustering all the strength he had left, he hoisted Mrs. Lovett up in his arms and rose, shaking, to his feet. He forced his knees to lock, and he stood, breathing thickly, cradling her against his chest.

"Where are we goin' t'go?" Toby cried. "There ain't nothin' round 'ere for miles!"

"Toby," Sweeney looked down at the boy, his voice deep and firm. Toby looked back at him with pleading eyes. "Listen to me. I need you to stay calm. We're going to follow the river due east. Sooner or later it will run past a village or a house. _We're going to be alright_. But I need you to _stay calm, _do you understand?"

Sniffling, the beginnings of tears shining in his eyes, Toby shook his head fiercely up and down. Sweeney nodded once at him, then turned and began walking.

Walking. Just walking. Trudging. One foot in front of the other, one step at a time. Toby hurried along quickly at his side, sniffing every few seconds and casting repeated, bleary-eyed glances at Mrs. Lovett.

Sweeney forced himself not to look down at her. He remembered the deep cut slowly trickling blood down the side of her face…it was rather ironic, really, that he had spent roughly the last year of his life practically bathing in blood on a regular basis and never once even batting an eyelid…and now, a few small, relatively harmless trickles that weren't even touching him made him feel nearly sick to his stomach. Why?

_You know why._

He forbid himself from thinking about it. He forced the image from his mind. He couldn't fall apart…not now. There was nothing he could do but move forward. He _had_ to keep moving; the most important thing was to get out of the cold. He could already feel Mrs. Lovett's body beginning to tremble, shivering and convulsing even in her unconsciousness.

_Just keep moving._

And so they did. They kept moving.

Twilight fell. The broad, endless horizon of the countryside was painted like a vast, celestial watercolor in deep rose and purple, bleeding into the rich, inky navy of the impending night sky. The sun would be sinking down beneath the horizon any minute, taking with it the very last traces of warmth and light it had allowed the three weary souls staggering along beside the river. Sweeney had never been more exhausted in his life…never, not even when he had been shipwrecked at sea for three days before being rescued by the _Bountiful. _At least then he'd had the floating remains of his mangled, makeshift raft to cling to…now, he had no support anywhere, and it wasn't only his own safety that was at risk. The ground swayed violently beneath his feet, threatening to topple he and his precious burden off their feet any tissue and fiber of his body was screaming at him with every step he took. Mrs. Lovett hung heavy against his arms and his chest, her head lolling gently back and forth as he struggled to keep stumbling forward. His teeth chattered uncontrollably, his entire body trembling as his jerking breaths puffed in and out in visible white clouds.

_Just keep moving…._

"There!! There, Mr. Todd, look!"

He looked up. Up ahead of them on the horizon sat a small, modest little farmhouse, surrounded by one or two fenced in acres of land. Beside it stood the tall, peaked roof of a barn. He was too tired for relief, too numb for joy at the sight of the blessed reprieve. He knew only one thing…to keep moving forward.

The windows in the small farmhouse were lit, but it was almost completely dark outside; they went the long way around to the far side of the property so that the barn was between them and the house, and there they carefully climbed over the fence ( this was especially difficult for Sweeney, precariously cradling Mrs. Lovett as he was…it was fortunate the wooden rail fence was only about waist-high ) and snuck silently to the barn.

Toby heaved his weight against the wide, creaking door, sliding it to the side with as minimal noise as possible, and they slipped inside, closing it again behind them. The air in the barn was close and musty, perfumed with the earthy, dirty smells of hay and animals and manure, but it was at least warmer than outside. There was a single lit lantern hanging from a nail on the wall; Toby quickly seized it and began searching the place, lifting it over his head to cast the short reach of the light over everything. It was a typical, mid-sized barn, with a hay loft built above the small horse stalls, in one of which a single flea-bitten, ancient old dapple stood asleep on its feet. Sweeney's bleary eyes fell upon the ladder climbing up to the loft.

"Up there, Toby," he croaked, his voice hoarse and his throat bone dry. Toby quickly scrambled up the ladder, managing to get the lantern and the carpetbag up with him in one trip. He disappeared for a moment beyond the ledge, then returned, leaning over and extending the lantern to light the way.

"'Ow will you get 'er up 'ere?" he asked anxiously.

Rather than answer him aloud, Sweeney slowly, ever so cautiously, shifted Mrs. Lovett in his arms until he supported her with one arm beneath her thighs and let her body lean against him, her head over his shoulder, almost the way one would hold a small child. He grunted softly, his face contorting with the strain. With his one free arm, he slowly ascended the ladder, one rung at a time.

At last, all three of them were safely atop the hay loft, hidden just a few scant feet from the wooden slant of the roof. The tightly wound bales of hay had been forked loose all around the loft over the course of the first few weeks of winter; great, yellow mounds of it lay heaped everywhere. Sweeney immediately knelt in the soft mass and gently lay Mrs. Lovett down, carefully holding a hand to support beneath her head until the last moment. Toby scrambled over and knelt down at her other side, holding up the lantern and looking worriedly down at her face.

For the first time in hours, Sweeney allowed himself look at her…truly look at her. He scrutinized every inch of her, drinking her in, assessing the harm that had been done by her fall. The blood had long since coagulated at the wound in her head, and the streaks of it running down past her left temple had crusted brown and dry…yet she had not regained consciousness. Her clothes were still damp completely through, as were his…her already pale skin appeared to have literally taken on the pallor of drowned whiteness, making the dark circles beneath her eyes seem all the more dark and sunken. Her lips were tinged with faint traces of blue. Sweeney felt it again as he surveyed her cold, still body, her face, so blank and devoid of the feeling and liveliness that always bubbled out of her….he felt the sharp gnawing of that hollow, cavernous place inside his chest where his heart should have been, but wasn't.

"We've got to warm her up, Toby," he said, forcing his gaze to break from her and looking up at the boy. "What have we got in the last bag?"

Toby reached behind him and opened the bag, hurriedly searching through it.

"We've got….bread, gin, the lantern…."

Sweeney's ears perked up. "There should be clothes there as well. Take out everything, everything we have left."

Toby nodded, extracting handful after handful of wadded fabric, pulling the clothes out in a connected stream until they lay heaped in a great pile beside him. Fortunately, there seemed to be several items left belonging to each of them…enough at least for all of them to be able to change into something substantial and dry. Their coats and boots would simply have to be let to air dry.

Carefully, gently, so as not to jostle her body unnecessarily, Sweeney worked Mrs. Lovett's arms out of her coat and slid it out from beneath her, tossing it aside onto the hay. He extended one hand in Toby's direction without looking up.

"Give me something dry," he ordered shortly.

No response.

He looked up, eyes already narrowed in preparation to snap some compliance into the boy; and stopped. Toby already had one of Mrs. Lovett's plain, long-sleeved dresses clutched in his hands ( thank goodness the woman had at least had enough sense not to pack any of her ridiculous, sleeveless, billowing, lace-covered numbers ), but he was staring at him with a strange expression that it took Sweeney a moment to place. He looked…_squirmy. _

"A-are you goin' to…to…ch-change 'er, then?"

Sweeney froze, his arm still hanging in midair.

_Oh, bloody hell._

He looked back down at Mrs. Lovett lying innocently before him, clad only in her white nightgown, her head rolling limply to one side and bits of hay already sticking in her wild red hair. Her chest was rising and falling ever so shallowly with her unconscious, rhythmic breath…and Sweeney realized with an abrupt twist of his insides that he was staring, rather unblinkingly, at that particular region.

Something happened to him then that had not happened to him in longer than he could humanly remember.

He blushed.

He tore his eyes away from her body, staring down at the hay with his mouth open and an enormous lump welling just above his larynx. He felt all of the blood rushing to his face, heating and darkening, his heart popping back into existence and hammering faster and faster as he realized what he had just come a hair's width from doing without the slightest realization.

Mercifully, however, the intense awkwardness of the situation was dwarfed and forgotten by the immediate urgency of getting Mrs. Lovett out of her damp clothes. Sweeney shook himself once and took a deep breath, turning his back to her. He cleared his throat, but even so, his voice still croaked minutely as he choked out,

"You do it, Toby."

The boy nodded, his face still drawn in a look of utmost embarrassment…but of course he realized it would be infinitely less inappropriate a task for someone of his age, and of his relation to Mrs. Lovett.

Not only that, but….

Sweeney closed his eyes, wishing darkly that he had the ability to strike himself momentarily deaf as he heard the distinct sounds of rustling hay and cloth behind him. He squeezed his eyes tighter, his hands fisting in the straw beneath his knees as he heard the shuffling of her body as Toby carefully undid her buttons, sliding the cotton garment down around her shoulders….then, he jumped as the unexpected sound of Toby exhaling loudly came to his ears. When the boy spoke, he sounded as if he were half-chuckling with immense relief.

"_Oh…._it's alright, Mr. Todd, 'er…uh…'er….the last thing 'ere is…its already dry. I 'spose it was thin enough that….we, uh…we can leave it on 'er."

Sweeney opened his eyes as a great knot in his stomach rapidly unclenched, the tension draining from his shoulders. He sighed just faintly with relief, wearily turning around and regarding them both.

His eyes shot open. His lips parted and the breath stopped dead in his throat. A wave of intense feeling, the explosion of a hot, vibrantly alive sensation, pooled somewhere in his lower stomach and shot instantly down into his groin. His head was screaming at him to turn away, but something else, a far greater and more primal force, kept his eyes glued unflinchingly where they were.

_DAMN THAT BOY TO HELL!!!_

Yes, it was true that Mrs. Lovett's innermost layer of clothing had wondrously become dry enough to allow them to leave it on her, relieving them of the almost unthinkable task of having to strip her down completely.

What Toby…either in his youthful innocence, or his consuming relief…had evidently failed to notice was that the undergarment Mrs. Lovett was wearing was nothing more than a white, silk chemise, short sleeved, slung unbelievably low, and cinched at the waist…a thin gown meant to be worn beneath the corset which she had, for obvious reasons, taken off before going to sleep that last night at the inn. Sweeney couldn't tear his eyes away. He couldn't even turn his head. He felt as if his entire body had gone completely paralyzed…except, of course, for the insatiably hot pulsing in his lower region which, to his mounting desperation, he realized he was totally unable to suppress.

Aside from the enormous, plunging view of cleavage the chemise provided, it also lacked the firm rigidity of her typical corset, meaning that he could see the supple, swelling shape and natural lines of her ample breasts in their complete and utter definition. Matters were only made worse by the fact that the chemise was made of silk…it hugged and flowed over her body like a liquid skin, tracing the curves of her slim waist and gentle hips, slipping down between her thighs, even dimpling in slightly at her naval.

It was his desperate lack of oxygen that finally enabled Sweeney to tear his eyes away. He jerked around, whirling his back to her once more, gasping for air as if he'd been running for a long time. A thin film of perspiration was glistening on his forehead, in spite of the stiff chill in the air, and his entire body was numb and searing at the same time, heat radiating through him in waves.

"Mr. Todd? What's wrong?"

_GOD DAMN IT, TOBY!!!_

"Nothing," he ground out unconvincingly through his clenched teeth and jaw, squeezing his eyes shut and struggling in vain to banish the image of her reclining, supple form from his mind's eye. "Just…hurry and _dress her already!"_

"Right," Toby muttered, returning quickly and obliviously to the clumsy task of gently working Mrs. Lovett's limbs into the cotton garment.

Meanwhile, Sweeney was reeling. His heart refused to slow, his body refused to calm down…it was as if he couldn't find his purchase on gravity again. What the hell was wrong with him?? This was no time to be having these kind of thoughts, these kind of…._urges_….she was unconscious, for God's sake, and probably grappling with the onset of hypothermia.

Besides, it wasn't as if he'd never seen her before. He'd seen virtually no one _but_ her for what felt like half a lifetime…and parading around in those gaudy dresses of hers the way she always did…of course his head had been turned a bit, now and again. She was a woman, after all, and even man as cold and bitterly indifferent as he wasn't in_human_.

"_Down by the sea…."_

_His hand slipped discretely onto her thigh…._

"…_.married nice and proper."_

_It slipped off again._

No. Even he wasn't inhuman.

But never…._never…._had he _ever _even come close to having a reaction like _that _before. It was as much as he could manage just to try and catch his breath again.

He had forgotten he even had the ability to feel that way. It had been so long, so long since his mind and his emotions had been able to focus on anything other than bitterness and rage and revenge….so long since he had actually looked at a woman, and felt anything other than fresh stabs of misery and despair at the loss of his Lucy…

He opened his eyes, still breathing hard. Try as he might to quell it, the raging pulses of pleasure and excitement were still throbbing inside him. He'd forgotten this kind of feeling even existed. It was like being reborn.

_Lust. He had forgotten it even existed. He had forgotten how incredibly powerful it was._

But…no…this was something more, something undeniably more. It may have been more than fifteen long years since it last happened, but he had still felt the burning hunger of the flesh before, and as the familiar memories of it rushed back to him all at once, he knew….he _knew…._that this feeling, this incredible sensation rushing through his body when he looked at her…was much more than simple lust.

_Not that the lust wasn't a painfully large part of it, as well, _he thought, grimacing and failing to stifle a small groan as the intense pulse continued to surge mercilessly in his groin. The startling realization occurred to him for the very first time that it had been more than _fifteen bloody years _since his natural male needs had been satisfied. The remarkable thought had honestly never once crossed his mind, at least not consciously…but now that it did, it was as if the smothered repression of every long year he'd spent alone broke loose upon him all at once, making the image of Mrs. Lovett's gently rising and falling breasts burn that much more agonizingly in his head.

And immediately following the crescendo of that thought, another abruptly burst into his mind, a thought that he would never have seen coming…but once it was there, he didn't know how he had possibly evaded it as long as he did.

_Why did I kiss her?_

And after that thought came another, a somewhat recessive one that made his face twist into a grimace of absolute incredulity as he stared down unseeingly into the hay.

_I kissed Mrs. Lovett._

No other words could possibly strengthen the staggering revelation of that simple fact.

_**I kissed Mrs. Lovett.**_

_Why?_

All at once his memory whisked him away to another place and another time, an ancient scene long buried and forgotten. He was standing in Mrs. Lovett's kitchen, staring miserably at the glass of gin in his hand, when suddenly the words she was muttering to herself began to sink in and cause his ears to prick.

"…_business never better, usin' on'y pussycats and toast….now, a pussy's good for maybe six or seven at the most….and I'm sure they can't compare as far as taste…."_

_Before he knew it he was on his feet, both the gin and the misery abruptly forgotten, a faint, wicked smile of amazement slowly turning on his face._

"_Mrs. Lovett, you're a bloody wonder! Eminently practical, and yet appropriate as always…Mrs. Lovett, how I lived without you all those years, I'll never know!"_

_And before he knew it he had seized her by the waist, pulling her into his arms and twirling her around the kitchen, gazing deeply into those devilishly brilliant eyes of hers, marveling at the incredible, ingenious simplicity of the idea…of __**her**__ idea…._

His eyes popped open, the surreal rush of warmth and familiarity flooding through his chest. Of course, that was it. That moment in the pie shop, that ancient memory that felt as if it had come from more than a lifetime ago…that was the same feeling he'd had in the woods when it was she who had unwittingly deduced how the Beadle had found them. He'd been stricken by her mad, quirky brilliance, just as he had the day she invented the notion of baking his victims into pies, and with his earnest amazement had come, just as before, the unexpected burst of affection.

_Yes…yes, of course, that was it._

_That had to be it…._

_Had to be…._

"Finished, sir," Toby breathed, snapping Sweeney from his reverie. Slowly, cautiously, almost wincing in half-dread…he forced himself to look over his shoulder.

He gave a long, weary exhale when he saw that Mrs. Lovett was finally completely decent. The simple, long-sleeved, navy blue dress covered everything except a relatively modest bit of skin around her neck and collarbone. The faintest trace of cleavage was visible, but compared to the incapacitating sight he'd witnessed just moments ago ( the effects of which had yet to wholly dissipate from the area below his belt ), that was nothing.

_Your purpose. Just think about your purpose. _

"Good," he muttered awkwardly, clearing his throat. Desperate for something to occupy himself with, he remembered his own damp and freezing clothes, and quickly rummaged through the heap until he found a dry set for himself. He stood up and changed as rapidly as he could, focusing every bit of his attention on unbuttoning this and shrugging out of this and sliding into that. He was fully dressed in dry clothes altogether too soon, and then there was nothing else but to stiffly return to kneel at Mrs. Lovett's side, looking over her opposite from Toby.

"What now?" the boy asked eagerly.

"Blankets…all of them."

Seconds later, they had been fetched. Sweeney forced himself to avoid looking at her face, or at much of any of her, for that matter, as he and Toby worked together to variably cocoon her with four of their seven blankets. They tucked them beneath and all around her, making certain every part of her was covered except for her face and a bit of her neck so as not to restrict her breathing. Then, Sweeney set to examining the cut on her forehead. He took the cleanest scrap of fabric he could find among their various articles and wet it with a splash of gin, gently washing the dried blood away and cleaning around the laceration as best he could. Thankfully, the cut was as superficial as he'd hoped; it was relatively shallow, and had congealed enough to the point that it wasn't even in urgent need of a bandage, which was fortunate since they had none. Once that was done, Sweeney heaved a great, exhausted sigh, remembering once again the aching stiffness in his tired muscles and joints. To his immense relief, his body had finally calmed down completely from it's manic surge into sensual overdrive…but now, in the wake of that surge, he was left feeling more drained and fatigued than he had already been. He sat down in the hay, arching his back and resting his forehead in his hand.

_Fucking hell….what a day…._

"Mr….Mr. Todd?"

_God in heaven, what now…._

Scowling begrudgingly, he opened his eyes and looked up at Toby.

"What?" he snapped.

Toby flinched anxiously, drawing back slightly and swallowing. "It's just…I…I was just thinkin,' sir….wouldn' it….I mean, wouldn' it be….I mean, if we….if we---"

"_Spit it out," _Sweeney groaned harshly, shooting the boy an exhausted glare. Toby flinched again, closing his eyes as he blurted out,

"Wouldn' it be warmer if we all…slept together?"

Sweeney blinked. He stared blankly at the boy.

_Slept together?_

"What?" he mumbled tonelessly.

Toby squirmed nervously. "Well, it's…I mean, it's still rather chilly in 'ere, ain't it? I mean, wouldn' it be a lot warmer if we all sort of…I-I don't know…slept…up nex' to each other, you know….all….close like?"

For a moment, Sweeney just stared at him.

_Toby._

_Toby. How long had it been since he had actually stopped to give the scrawny little urchin a second thought?_

Sweeney's sharp glare softened minutely.

_Since that night I failed to kill him._

As he looked deep into the boy's wide, dark brown eyes…his dirty little face, his dark, scraggly hair, perpetually mussed…his small, skinny, but sturdy little frame…he remembered the night they had first run away from London, the night he had looked at Toby and Mrs. Lovett standing together and first made the horrible realization that he had become like a father again.

_A father._

But whose? Toby's? This pathetic little whelp who followed Mrs. Lovett around like a dog? This scraggly little nuisance who was constantly underfoot, constantly in the way…he was the pebble in Sweeney's shoe, like the speck in his eye too tiny and insignificant to be picked out, but just large enough to be felt. Toby. The great gnat. The great inconvenience.

Sweeney's glare lifted further. He blinked.

_Why, then, had he allowed the boy to live?_

He had never asked himself that question. Never. Now that he actually thought about it, it would have been no trouble…no trouble at all…to have simply killed the boy and been done with it. True, he had managed to escape him that fateful night in the bake-house, but what of the four days afterward that he spent incapacitated on the chaise with a bandaged head? Sweeney distrusted him every minute of those four days, never once doubting that the moment he woke up he would be off and running to the law just as fast as his scrawny legs could carry him. The practical thing…the _logical _thing…would have been to do away with him while he slept. It would have been simple. Hell, it would even have been an easy matter to make it look like an accident, for Mrs. Lovett's sake….one good bash on the head, with just the right force and in just the right place, in the middle of the night….and she'd waking up thinking he'd died of a delayed reaction to his injuries. Then they would have at last been rid of the little pest forever.

Toby continued to look at him, his eyes full of question marks. Sweeney's scowl had faded completely, now.

_Why?_

_Why did I let him live?_

Suddenly, the boy looked away. He turned his eyes down, and slowly took up one of the three remaining blankets. He wrapped it around his shoulders and crawled through the hay to Mrs. Lovett's side, where he lay down next to her with his head on her shoulder. His eyes were open, but he kept them carefully averted from Sweeney's gaze.

"Sorry," he mumbled apologetically, in a voice that was almost a whisper. "For…er…forget I said anything."

He closed his eyes.

As Sweeney looked into the small boy's quiet face, his closed eyelids, his smudged skin, the rounded curves of his youthful features….he felt something. A warmth…a strange kind of fluttering warmth, like wings, in his chest. For what felt like a long time, he sat there, staring quizzically, trying to remember what that feeling was. Toby became stiller and more relaxed, the final traces of worry melting from his face. His breathing eventually became shallow and audibly, and Sweeney knew he was on the very verge of sleep if not already there. With his eyes still closed, he snuggled closer against Mrs. Lovett, nuzzling his face nearer to the exposed skin at her neck.

The warmth inside peaked and an invisible wall seemed to burst, letting the gentle softness spread throughout his whole body. His face, a mixture of sorrow and disbelief, stared immovably toward them, a mother and her son, together. A mother and her child…his Mrs. Lovett, and her Toby.

He knew where he'd seen those faces. He knew where he'd felt that kind of warmth.

He knew why he'd let the boy live.

_Johanna…. _

He didn't know when it had happened, when this part of him had grown back. But it had. He had fought it for so long…fought it with both of them, the return of these human emotions he thought he had stamped out forever, years ago, deep within the stone walls of the prison in Australia. And yet here they were, flooding inside of him, spreading slowly until they filled every orifice of his being.

Toby suddenly shuddered violently as a fierce wind from outdoors shook the creaky foundations of the barn, and a cold draft filtered in through the numerous cracks and holes in the walls. The boy's eyes flickered open, and he curled tightly against Mrs. Lovett, shivering against the chill.

Sweeney looked at him a moment longer. His eyelids closed softly, briefly.

He saw Benjamin, Benjamin Barker, and Lucy, and tiny baby Johanna. He saw them standing together inside the mirror at his old barbering table. Benjamin had his arm around Lucy's shoulders, leaning over to kiss her gently on the cheek. Then he looked down at the swaddled bundle in her arms, smiling broadly and bending over her, stroking his fingertips lovingly across her downy blond head. Johanna stared back up at him, her enormous eyes still blue. Benjamin smiled at Lucy, and they both fawned over Johanna together, cooing and caressing her.

Sweeney stared at the image in the mirror, his face blank, his heart empty. For an instant, he began to lift his hand to reach out to them, but halfway through, he stopped. His arm fell back limply to his side. He was alone. Alone on the dark side of the mirror.

Then, suddenly, he wasn't alone. He felt a warmth and a pressure at his right hand as someone took hold of it and squeezed it. He started and jerked his head up. Mrs. Lovett stood beside him, her pale face calm and blank. Then, slowly, she smiled…the smallest, faintest smile in the world. But it was there, just the same. He looked deep into her eyes, and slowly, slowly…he felt the beating of his own heart, returning, filling the void of emptiness.

He felt a gentle touch on his arm and looked down. In front of Mrs. Lovett stood Toby, looking up at him with wide, trusting eyes, and that expression…not a smile, but something deeper…a look of pure, unadulterated need. Trust, and need.

Sweeney opened his eyes, and there they were, lying together in the rich, golden darkness of the hayloft, with nothing but the faint light of the lantern casting long shadows over their peaceful faces. Toby, and Mrs. Lovett.

Toby, and Nellie. A woman and her child.

_His woman. His child. _

_He was a father again._

_And his family needed him._

Slowly, Sweeney drew close to them. He leaned over Nellie first, placing a hand gently on her forehead. He felt more of the tension drain from him, replaced by exquisite relief as he found that the sharp chill had vanished completely from her skin, and that she radiated a warmth almost back to that of a fully healthy person. Then, he reached behind him and took up the remaining two blankets. He spread one of them out over them, tucking it beneath them and gently shifting Nellie's body, ever so slowly as not to wake her, until she lay on her side face the child.

Toby started violently and jerked his head around when he felt the hand light on his shoulder. His eyes widened.

"M-Mr. Todd!"

"Shhhh," Sweeney hissed, flinching and holding up a hand for silence. "Quiet, boy."

Carefully, his arms and legs feeling stiff and out of place, ignoring as best he could the strange lump growing in his throat…Sweeney laid down in the hay beside them, turning on his side to face the wide-eyed, disbelieving Toby. The boy's mouth hung open slightly, staring, looking as if he wanted to speak but could find no words. As Sweeney lay down, he realized Toby was trembling from head to foot, wrapped as he was with nothing but a few sparse blankets.

Sweeney's face was blank. But inside him, something was alive. Something that had been dead for fifteen years.

_Be indifferent?_

_No. Not anymore. It's time. Time to stop being indifferent._

_Time to feel again._

In the mirror, on his barbering table, deep in the depths of his mind…the faces of Benjamin and Lucy and Johanna slowly, quietly faded away into the darkness.

_Lucy….Johanna…._

…_.goodbye._

_Goodbye, for the last time._

Toby finally found his voice, and when he did it choked out in a hoarse, stifled squeak.

"But..Mr. T-Todd…don' you think…doesn' mum---I mean, Mrs. Lovett---"

"Quiet," he said again, whispering this time. "She's alright now. She's going to be fine."

"But…I…"

"Listen to me," he said, his voice rumbling firmly. "You're too cold. Fall asleep like that and you won't wake up tomorrow."

Toby looked at him in silent disbelief.

Then, his small, questioning eyes bugged open and everything seemed to move in surreal, elevated sensation as Sweeney worked one arm beneath the boy's small body and pulled him against his chest. He went stiff as a board as Sweeney inched them both closer to Nellie, the hay rustling beneath them as he sandwiched all of them tightly against each other. He took the last blanket and wrapped it around himself and Toby, grunting softly with effort, then letting his breath rush out as his body went limp all at once, the sheer overwhelming weight of his exhaustion sapping the last bit of strength out of him. Immediately his eyelids began to flicker. Knowing that he was only seconds away from passing out, he reach his free right arm over Toby, beneath the blanket, and secured his hand on Nellie's back, pulling her closer, which in turn pressed Toby flush up against his chest. The boy's body was so near, he could feel his small heart beating wildly.

Sweeney closed his eyes, forgetting everything, drinking in the wonderful relief of impending sleep.

A tiny voice reached his ears, whispering, muffled against the fabric of his shirt.

"Mr. Todd."

He kept his eyes closed. "Yes," he droned half-heartedly in reply.

"Are…are we goin' t'make it? Are we goin' to get away, someday…and 'ave a 'ome again, somewhere, where we're safe?"

Sweeney yawned enormously. "Yes," he managed to say through it.

Silence, sweet, beautiful silence. For a moment. Then,

"Mr. Todd."

He winced, suppressing the urge to growl irrately. "What, boy?" he muttered wearily. _Bloody hell, go to sleep already…._

"I've never 'ad a dad before."

Sweeney's eyes shot open. He stared forward into the darkness, still as a statue. His heart throbbed once, and the warmth emanating from within him suddenly began filtering all through his body once more as he felt Toby nuzzle against his chest, his cheek resting over his heart and his hands fisting ever so lightly in the fabric of his shirt. He slowly looked down, but all he could see was darkness, the crown of Toby's head fitting closely beneath his chin. His throat felt strangely thick as if he were swallowing around an enormous lump. For a moment the words seemed to echo in his head…..

_I've never 'ad a dad before._

Sweeney's mind raced, his dry throat feeling strongly as if it wanted to speak...but he couldn't think of a possible thing to say in reply. Moments later, Toby was fast asleep.

Outside, the winter wind howled and the walls of the barn leaned and groaned. But the three of them lay warm and safe, held close and secure, together in the hay.

And like that, Sweeney fell asleep, with one arm resting gently over Nellie, and the other holding Toby to his chest. A woman and her child. His woman. His child. And for the first time in his life…the first time since he'd made his entrance into the world, in that dark, blood splattered prison cell fifteen years ago….Sweeney Todd was a man.

Her man.

And his father.

A/N; And there you have it! I was up until _three o'clock in the morning _finishing this, so I apologize for any slights of grammar or spelling that may inadvertently have occurred. Hopefully this chapter still rocked! Was it awesome? Did the character fantasy pleasure center of your brain explode with joy? Or do you want to hunt me down and hit me in the shins with baseball bats? Whatever your answer….REVIEWS MAKE ME SMILE!


	19. Chapter 19

A/N; Chapter 19! Woot! I sincerely apologize that it took me this long to finish…that pesky old "real world" keeps getting in my way. Anyway, I just want to promise that no matter how long it takes me ( hopefully not too long! ) I _am going to finish this story. _Thanks for your patience! Enjoy!

Disclaimer; I don't own Sweeney Todd, and neither do you. I get no money for writing, you get no money for reading. Let's go pick out matching hobo suits at the thrift store.

Chapter 19

_Yes, I Lied 'Cause I Love You_

or

_I'm Sorry, Eleanor_

The moment Sweeney opened his eyes, he groaned softly in sheer exhaustion. A wave of frustration rolled over him, tempting him to simply let himself fall asleep again and forget everything about the miserable world and his miserable life in it.

Bright, golden shafts of light streamed in arrow-straight rays through every crack and hole in the barn walls, filling the room with a shadowy, yet surprisingly luminescent glow. If he was any judge, the three of them had slept past noon already. Sweeney closed his eyes and cursed inwardly.

They had overslept.

_Damn it. _In their precarious situation, they couldn't afford to stay in any one place for too long. For all they knew, the Beadle could be mere minutes away from discovering them in that decrepit, rundown barn. It was foolish not to assume that if he found them in that inn in the middle of nowhere, he could find them virtually anywhere. _Damn it. _Sweeney had never had trouble mentally waking himself at any hour he wished before….it would figure that at perhaps the one time in his life when it was most important, his internal clock would fail him. _Damn it!_

As his body gradually climbed up out of the deep, numbing depths of sleep, he blinked repeatedly, his mind clearing and purpose surging through his limbs, alertness filling his being. _They had to go. They had to go before…._

He tried to get up, and the events of the previous night rushed back to him all at once, and he remembered Toby. The boy was still fast asleep, in exactly the same place as he had been when Sweeney blacked out. The only difference was that sometime in the night his skinny arms had snaked their way around Sweeney's torso, hugging him tightly. He craned his neck to look down at the child's smudged face, his cheek pushed against his vest, his mouth open as he breathed shallowly. Sweeney felt an unpleasant, squirming kind of warmth rising in his chest. His body felt stiff and awkward in the boy's small embrace…how many years had it been since he had been this close to a child? All the traces of emotional reticence that had been erased last night beneath the liberating berth of exhaustion and necessity seemed to be slowly resurfacing within him. He looked at Toby for a long moment, his face narrowed in an uncertain stare.

_Toby. His….his…_

Sweeney swallowed. He knew something between them had changed, he was certain of it. No amount of discomfort or awkwardness could negate the solid truth of that epiphany he had had before the mirror in his mind. But nevertheless, for some reason…he still couldn't bring himself to form the word, even in his subconscious.

_Toby had become his….his….his…._

No. He just couldn't do it. Not yet.

Finally, after what felt like an endless moment of silence and stillness, he at last worked up the nerve to gingerly extricate himself from Toby's grasp, carefully turning the boy onto his other side so that his arms could latch safely onto Mrs. Lovett before the sudden absence of a warm body woke him up. The two of them seemed to subconsciously draw near to each other, snuggling close even as they continued to sleep.

Sweeney got to his feet, every muscle in his body aching and protesting the littlest movement. He grimaced, stretching his arms above his head, then behind his back, in every direction. His back was screaming…he placed his palms over the small of it and growled softly in pain as he leaned back, letting the vertebrae crack gently inside him. _Damn…_he'd probably gone and strained it, carrying Mrs. Lovett all that way in those heavy wet clothes…

_Mrs. Lovett._

At the second pass of her name through his mind, his attention immediately swooped down on her. He turned around, walking over and kneeling as quietly as he could down beside her. He carefully pulled the curly red wisps of hair from her forehead, placing the back of one finger on her skin. She was warm. Her cheeks were flushed lightly, and all of the disturbing blue pigmentation had at last vanished from her lips. She was breathing thickly, her characteristic snoring buzzing softly out from her sinuses. As he looked down at her, at last knowing that she was really going to be alright, Sweeney suddenly felt something. Something extremely foreign.

It was as if the muscles in his face had atrophied, and were all of a sudden in dire want of movement. They began to itch suddenly, as if they were restless, wanting to be stretched and put back to use. The corners of his mouth twitched suspiciously.

Mrs. Lovett snorted suddenly in her sleep, a gentle sound, but fully audible nonetheless. Not only did the twitchy sensation around his mouth heighten immensely, he also felt the tingling sensation creeping down mischievously into his abdomen. Then all of a sudden the tension snapped out of him like the cutting of a taut chord…something cracked. Something that had been stiff and lifeless and waxed in plaster for countless ages split straight down the middle and broke apart.

Sweeney smiled.

He realized what had happened a split second after it was too late, and his involuntary grin immediately relaxed into a straight line of disbelief. He had smiled. Not the way he had smiled when they had spun around the pie shop, not the way he had smiled when he spoke to Beadle Bamford in the marker, not the way he had smiled when he told Anthony of his plan to pass him off as a wigmaker's apprentice. This was not a smile of wickedness, of savoring vengeance. It was just…a smile. A real, honest, human smile, without any malice or predetermination at all.

For a brief moment, it terrified him. Then it seemed to diffuse into a dull kind of numb warmth, and he staggered to his feet and moved away from Mrs. Lovett and Toby.

_She'd actually made him smile. And that feeling in his chest….was it possible? He'd actually been seconds away from laughing. _

Before he could head it off, he was assaulted by the memory of her lips…full, warm, trembling, as they pressed against his in the snowy wood less than a full day ago. The _smack _as they parted seemed to echo in his ears, the mere memory of it completely eclipsing the actual sounds of the barn creaking and the old dappled horse beneath them snorting and clopping its feet every few minutes.

_He had initiated that kiss. __**Him.**_ _He'd smiled. __**Him. Sweeney Todd. **__Had actually smiled._

_What the bloody fucking hell was happening to him?_

"Mmmm."

The tiny noise behind him cut through his thoughts like…well, like a sharpened razor through something soft. His ears pricked up and all the tension that his smile had cut away reformed instantly, making him go stiff as a board. He turned around and saw what he knew he would see….Mrs. Lovett, sitting up, blinking and looking extremely disoriented. Yellow bits of straw were poking out of her hair every which way, the cottony neckline of her dress hanging slightly askew off of one shoulder. She knit her brows in a faint grimace, smearing her hand over her face. Sweeney just stood there and stared at her, his heart palpitating.

"Mmmmm. Where in the…bloody 'ell…."

She opened her eyes and peered groggily around her. Her gaze fell on him and for a long moment she stared blatantly, as if unable to make out who he was.

"Mr. T? Where the 'ell are we?" she mumbled.

Sweeney's lips parted, but no sound came out. His mouth was suddenly cotton-dry. He watched as Mrs. Lovett untangled herself from the mass of blankets swaddled around her legs, her movements jerky and clumsy almost as if she were intoxicated. His opened his mouth to protest as she staggered onto her feet, but he had no time to speak…he saw it coming before it happened and darted forward. Almost immediately after getting to her feet, Mrs. Lovett uttered a soft, gasping squeak and pitched forward dizzily, completely loosing her footing. Sweeney sprang towards her and caught just before she went down face first on the wooden planks of the hay loft.

"Ohhh…" she groaned gently, touching her forehead. Sweeney carefully steadied her in his arms, helping her regain her purchase on the ground. "Mr. T," she muttered, her eyes closed, looking almost as if she were in pain, "What…what 'appened?"

"You…fell," he said shortly, discovering that his voice was constricted for some reason.

"Fell…fell?"

"Through the ice. Hit your head. Lay back down."

"Blimey, Mr. T, I _got_ to move a bit…I feel s'though I ain't been awake for a bloody week…"

"Quiet. Lay down."

Mrs. Lovett winced, but obediently let herself be lowered to sit back down on the mass of blankets beside Toby. She opened her eyes, blinking.

"Where are we?" she asked again.

"A barn, in the country."

"A barn?"

She looked around, picked up a single strand of hay between her fingers and inspected it.

"Yes, I'd say we are."

"We can't stay long," Sweeney said, kneeling down beside her. "The Beadle---"

But before he could even finish the sentence Mrs. Lovett groaned loudly. "Oh, ruddy bloomin' 'ell, Mr. Todd, I don't feel as if I could walk a straight line, let 'lone go runnin' round in that god-awful snow again…"

Sweeney's jaw clenched in protestation, but….it was funny, less than a week ago, if she had said something to him in that tone, openly interrupting and defying him that way, he would have felt the edges of furious anger creeping in and have had to stifle the urge to snarl at her. Now, however, as he sat there looking at her pale, weary face, drawn and exhausted….he knew she was right. If they tried to travel so soon after that close call of hers, she might very well faint again, and they'd be caught in the same predicament as before. Sweeney closed his eyes briefly. They had no choice.

"Alright," he muttered beneath his breath. "We'll rest a while."

"Thank 'eaven," she muttered.

The two of them fell silent, sitting next to each other in the hay for several long, awkwardly suspended moments. Toby was still fast asleep, lying curled up in his blanket nearby. Mrs. Lovett continued to rub her eyes and face, massaging her temples and running her fingers over her eyelids. She hesitated a moment as she traced over the line of the cut at her hairline. Sweeney watched her fingers closely, a strange, uncomfortable knot forming in his chest. He jumped and tore his eyes away when she suddenly spoke.

"Mr. T, I don't 'spose we got anythin' left as far as provisions go, do we? I'm so 'ungry I could eat a bloody 'orse…"

Sweeney inwardly let out an enormous sigh of relief at the prospect of a constructive task. For some reason he wasn't quite sure of, that gap of silence between them had been positively unbearable. Trying not to appear to eager, he calmly rose to his feet and began looking through their last remaining carpet bag. By a miraculous stroke of luck, it just so happened to be the bag that still held the meager remnants of their food supplies. At the sight of the bread, cheese, and last few bottles of gin, Sweeney realized with dim astonishment that none of them had eaten a single thing in well over twenty-four hours. It was a wonder they'd managed to get this far without collapsing. In response to the thought, Sweeney's own fierce, gnawing hunger was promptly awakened, and it amazed him that he'd gone this long without feeling it. His stomach even growled loudly as if on cue, and he felt his face warm slightly as he hastily took the handkerchief-wrapped bread and cheese from the carpet bag.

Mrs. Lovett cried out softly and seized the bread he handed her like a ravenous dog attacking a bone. Showing no reticence at all in regard to the fact that it was stale and tough as leather, she tore off an enormous hunk with her teeth and closed her eyes, making only a half-hearted effort to keep her mouth closed. Sweeney found himself watching her…_again…_and shook himself, narrowing his eyes in perturbation as he quickly turned away.

_What was wrong with him? Why was he gaping so intently at her every move?_

A small voice, buried somewhere deep within him, immediately answered the question for him.

_You missed her last night._

Sweeney blinked.

Bloody hell.

Where did that come from?

"We ought t'wake Toby," Mrs. Lovett's voice, muffled around the mouthful of bread, snapped him back to reality. "Poor thing's got to be 'alf starved 'imself…"

Sweeney glanced over at the boy, and almost immediately the instinctive, fatherly palpitations of warmth that had so disarmed him the night before threatened to start up again. He intentionally set his face into a blank, apathetic gaze, and turned back to his own breakfast.

"Let him sleep. He can eat when he gets up on his own."

Mrs. Lovett gave the boy another concerned look, but nodded her head wistfully in agreement. Within minutes, they had each plowed through their portions of the remaining rations, and if Mrs. Lovett was anything like Sweeney, he knew that she was also left feeling completely unsatisfied. He tilted his eyes slantways in her direction, and the pleading look she gave him confirmed that it was indeed so.

"There 'as to be _somethin' _else layin' about in this place," she muttered, the hunger shining like a second light in her brown eyes. "What about chickens? Eggs?"

Sweeney shook his head. _Silly woman, does she __**hear **__any chickens?_

"Vegetables then. There's got to be a bit of somethin' stored away in 'ere, I jus' _know _there 'as. Did you 'ave a look about, Mr. T?"

Sweeney opened his mouth to irately reinforce that he was sure there was no food in the barn…and stopped before the words formed. He looked at her a moment, then closed his mouth. All of a sudden he was completely tongue tied, and the laughable truth sank in that, _no, _he had not in fact even thought to look around the barn for food. They had been so preoccupied last night that---

_Last night._

A flooding torrent of images and sensations rushed back to him all in a blur, and to his complete and utter horror, he found himself looking at Mrs. Lovett and seeing her, not as she was now, clad in her navy cotton dress and watching him with perceptive alertness in her gaze….but as she had been for those few brief moments in the dim lamplight, her thin silk underwear sliding and slipping haphazardly off of her limp, delicate body. _Shit._

Sweeney jerked away from her gaze. "No," he croaked, his throat inexplicably dry.

Mrs. Lovett sighed. "Course you 'aven't. You'd think I'd know enough not to ask by now. I swear it, Mr. T, sometimes I 'aven't got the faintest clue what's goin' on in that dodgy 'ead o' yours. I wonder if----"

Her words floated in one ear and out the other. He wasn't listening to her. He was staring down at his hands, struggling to fight against the raging swell of memories, the heat and the epiphany of that pivotal instant.

_Why? Why had he kissed her???_

_You know why. _The small voice again. It nagged somewhere at the nape of his neck like a mosquito in the depths of his subconscious.

_Why couldn't he look at her without…remembering? Why did he feel this…this…__**tension, **__this unbelievable stiffness? This was Mrs. Lovett. His neighbor, his landlady, his accomplice in crime, his…his…._

_Your woman, _the voice whispered.

Sweeney shut his eyes tightly. He was vaguely aware of Mrs. Lovett still rambling on to herself just beside him, but her words had fazed into an endless line of unintelligible drabble. Inside his head, the little voice was getting stronger and thicker the more questions he couldn't keep from asking himself, the more times he feebly struggled to deny everything.

_She's not my woman!_

_Then what is she?_

_She's…she's a diversion. A goal, a diversion I'm using to keep Barker locked inside. Nothing more._

_Then why?_

_Nothing more…._

_Why can't you look at her, if she's just your diversion?_

_She's __**not **__my woman!!_

_It's because you feel it when you look at her. _

_I don't feel anything…._

_You feel it when you look at her face. That warmth. That excitement. You remember last night._

_I'm only human. Any man would have….would have…._

_You know the truth._

_She's just a diversion! _

_Then why?_

_Why what?_

_Why did you say goodbye?_

_Goodbye…._

_Lucy. Johanna. Why did you say goodbye to them?_

_Because they're gone!_

_Because you want it. You want to feel it. You want to let yourself look at her._

_SHE'S JUST A DIVERSION!_

_Why?_

_Why __**what??**_

_You know why what._

_Why…._

_Why did you kiss her?_

_I wasn't thinking!_

_Why did you kiss her?_

_It didn't mean anything!! That day in the pie shop…._

_Why did you kiss her?_

_I know why! It was no different than that day in the pie shop!_

_Why. Did. You. Kiss. Her?_

_She's just a bloody fucking diversion!_

_Sweeney. _

_She's…she's…._

_Why?_

Sweeney opened his eyes. His chest was rising and falling a bit faster than it had been an instant ago. He stared off into space, his face blank save for the faint trace of complete and utter loss, almost resembling sorrow, that was etched across his eyes.

"I don't know why," he whispered. The voice in his head didn't laugh. But it spoke as if it wanted to.

_You're lying._

"What, love?" Mrs. Lovett turned to him, breaking from her mindless, contented prattling.

Sweeney all but jumped out of his skin. He turned to look at her, struggling to shrug himself back into reality.

"I…I…."

"Oh, don't worry yourself over it. I'll go an' 'ave a look round. I'm sure I can find _somethin' _to eat in this Godforsaken…."

Sweeney's eyes widened. "Wait!" he said.

It was too late. Mrs. Lovett had foolishly wobbled to her feet again…much too quickly, this time….only to have happen exactly what Sweeney knew would happen. The instant she was standing up straight, a fluttering wave of dizziness visibly passed over her. Her eyes rolled just slightly in her head, and she immediately began to sway. Sweeney leapt to his feet behind her, jaw clenched in an exasperated growl…._What did the little fool expect?? Had she forgotten what had just happened moments earlier?…_ready to catch her. What he wasn't ready for was for her to whirl back, teetering on her toes, and crash into him so bluntly that it knocked the wind from his lungs and toppled them both over, the momentum spinning them around and landing them with soft THUMP, muffled in the piles of hay. Bits of straw drifted in the air around them, floating back down and landing on their clothes and hair. It was a gesture of divine mercy they hadn't fallen on top of poor Toby.

Sweeney felt himself fall, face down, on something soft, but firm…supple and at the same time pleasantly structured. Then he heard Mrs. Lovett coughing, gasping for air, and his entire body went rigid as he felt the mass beneath him jerking violently up and down so that something very soft and very pillow-like repeatedly touched the side of his face. Sweeney felt as if he'd been paralyzed from the neck-down.

It was a bit like watching a train-wreck. He dreaded opening his eyes, and at the same time couldn't possibly help himself from doing just that. He opened his eyes.

He was sprawled on top of Mrs. Lovett, his arms pinning her by the shoulders and their legs awkwardly entangled. Her head was turned to the side, her eyes squeezed shut as she coughed continually, trying to regain her breath. Moving involuntarily, Sweeney's eyes traveled slowly down her neck and came to stop over her covered chest, which he had landed with his head directly on top of, and which was currently heaving back and forth inches from his face in rhythm with her haggard gasping. The soft peaks of her bosom grazed his face with every inhale.

Sweeney just lay there, frozen, his face blank and his eyes narrowed incredulously. For the longest moment it didn't even register that his pressing weight was what was causing her to cough in the first place.

"Mr. Todd!" she choked, sucking in raspy breaths of air.

"Ahh…" he clumsily pushed his torso up off of her, resting on his elbows and embarrassingly shifting his body further upward to place his line of vision over her face rather than her breasts. At possibly the most inopportune moment imaginable, the voice in his head began nagging at him again.

_You know. You know why you kissed her._

_I don't!!_

_You're lying._

Mrs. Lovett coughed one last time, finally catching her stolen breath. She breathed deeply in and out, opened her eyes and looking up at him. For a single instant, their gazes locked, and they just lay there, frozen in place, staring at each other.

Sweeney's brain raced wildly, his heart threatening to give out any second for its fierce pounding. He found his voice before she did.

"Mrs. Lovett," he ground out between his teeth, scowling harshly down at her bewildered face. "What did you _think _was going to happen? I _told you to lie down."_

Mrs. Lovett blinked, her eyes suddenly dimming with a hurt gleam. She looked straight at him as she said it.

"Did you kiss me?"

The scowl vanished. A rock the size of his fist abruptly dropped into Sweeney's stomach and splashed acid all the way up to his tonsils. He stared at her, the slow-motion train wreck feeling seizing him again. His mouth opened, his lips repeatedly preparing to speak. But he said nothing.

Out of nowhere there were two dots of bright light gleaming in Mrs. Lovett's eyes. Tears welled in the corners and spread both ways, trickling in clear streams down her temples and vanishing in her wild hair.

"Mr. Todd. Just answer me. Was it real? Or did I dream it?"

_The crunch of the snow, the press of the carpet bags, the warmth of her lips…._

_Smack. Always that soft, delicate smack. Like an eternal echo._

"Please jus' tell me," Mrs. Lovett cried softly, her face contorting with gentle sobs and her beautiful mouth trembling. "Please Mr. Todd."

He just stared down at her. He felt pain welling up inside of him and spreading to his features, the hurt seeping through to twist him on the outside, but still, _still, _the voices waged inside of him.

_I don't know! I'm sorry!_

_You know! You're lying! Say it!_

_I DON'T KNOW!!_

"Please Mr. T," she whispered. The tears streamed from her eyes in two continuous, glistening lines.

His throat was working furiously, but it was as if an invisible gag had been stuffed into his mouth. He couldn't force himself to form the words. But at the same time, his face was sinking lower and lower towards hers, his eyes hopelessly trapped by her shining brown orbs.

_SAY IT!_

_I can't…._

_SAY IT!_

_Say what? What do I say to her??_

_You know._

_What, damn it???_

_YOU KNOW._

"Mrs….Mrs…" he began stammering helplessly. He couldn't even form the sound of her name.

_Isn't that old formality just a bit ridiculous at this point?_

_Why don't you just say her name?_

He could see it, the letters, etched in his mind, glowing like red hot coals. Nellie.

"Did you kiss me?" she demanded, her voice rising to a shrill, almost hysterical cry. "Tell me the truth, _did you kiss me??"_

_NELLIE! NELLIE! SAY IT!_

It was like drowning. Drowning in those horrible tears rolling down her temples. He was stone. He was carved from wood. He didn't have a face, didn't have a heartbeat, he couldn't so much as move his fingers. He wanted to stop her from crying. Never in as long as they'd been together had he wanted anything so badly. He didn't even try to tell himself he didn't.

_Nellie._

The voice was suddenly quiet. Gentle.

_Say it._

_What? _he pleaded desperately. _Say what??_

_The truth._

_But what is it? Just tell me!_

_The truth, Sweeney._

Suddenly the voice had a face. A familiar face. It was blurry, but there, imprinted on his mind like a poorly developed photograph.

_Sweeney. _

_Why did it bother saying his name?_

_The truth, Sweeney._

Mrs. Lovett closed her eyes and cried. Tears, shining, glistening in the morning light.

The face was getting clearer. It was sharp enough to have lines now. Sweeney seized it by the collar….it was clear enough to have clothes and a body now, as well…and shook it desperately.

_What is the truth?? What do I say? What do I say to make her stop???_

_The truth._

_WHAT IS IT???_

_**You love her.**_

_**Tell her that you love her.**_

Sweeney let go. He fell, falling, falling, through the dark of his mind, and the voice's face followed him. Fell until his eyes popped open, his jaw dropped, breath rushed into his lungs. He was looking down at Mrs. Lovett's face again…she had turned away from him and given herself over to silent, shaking sobs. As he stared down at her with his body, in his mind, he looked up to the face. It was clear enough now to have eyebrows. And trimmed brown hair.

_Tell Nellie you love her._

Sweeney stood there, lost, helpless, his face twisted in sorrow.

_I can't, _he whispered.

_Why?_

_I don't know._

_You can't?_

Sweeney lowered himself down from his elbows. He let his torso slide down, easing gently, until all of his weight was pressed evenly over Mrs. Lovett to keep from hurting her. He let his head fall wearily over her shoulder and pressed his cheek into the crook of her neck, his face buried in the soft tangles of her hair. He breathed in. He felt her sobbing, felt her arms encircle around his back and hug him tightly to her. He forced his own arms beneath her, digging through the hay, and held her twice as hard. When she whispered through her tears he could feel the hum of her voice through her neck.

"It was real, Sweeney, wasn't it? I didn't imagine it. It was real."

_He looked at the face._

"_I can't."_

_The face smiled._

_It was Benjamin Barker._

"_I knew you couldn't," he answered calmly._

_-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-_

Nellie almost didn't notice it when Mr. Todd's body suddenly jerked, seizing briefly, as if every one of his muscles had suddenly gone taut. He stayed that way, completely stiff, only for an instant…then he relaxed again, nuzzling deep into the crook of her neck. She sniffed loudly, the tears burning as they continued to flow.

_She knew it. She knew it._

_He did kiss me. He really did._

"Sweeney," she whispered. "Sweeney."

He didn't say anything. His body was suddenly limp.

"Sweeney. I have to tell you something."

He didn't move. Nellie closed her eyes. She couldn't feel anything…no pain, no fear, nothing. Nothing but the solid reality of her arms around his torso, the inescapability of his weight pressing down on top of her, the smell of his hair, his skin. God, what a mess she was. No corset, no makeup, hair flying everywhere, loaded with bits of straw, eyes puffy and running….nose probably running, too, what with her luck. This was certainly not the way she had always pictured this moment in her mind, imagined it in her dreams.

But it didn't matter.

_Oh, fuck my runny nose._

She couldn't stop herself. Not this time. She turned her head and put her lips so close to his ear they gently grazed the skin.

"I love you."

He didn't move. She squeezed him tighter, crying harder. The instant the words escaped her lips, she felt as if a string that had been cinched in a suffocating knot around her heart for nearly a year was suddenly cut loose. The life seemed to grow back inside of her all at once. She turned her head and kissed his cheek, once, twice, over and over, the tears streaming all the while.

"I love you Mr. Todd. I love you so much."

Mr. Todd didn't make a sound. He didn't so much as flinch.

Nellie swallowed, opening her eyes.

"Mr. Todd." She jostled her body, shaking him gently. "Mr. Todd."

Nothing.

"Sweeney?"

At that instant, the quiet, dusty atmosphere of the barn was blasted apart.

_**PAAUUCCHH! PAAUUCCHH! PAAUUCCHH!**_

Nellie shrieked and instinctively buried her face in Mr. Todd's shoulder as the piercing jolt of three successive gunshots ripped the air into jagged shards. The reports echoed deafeningly across the open fields, stinging her ears even through the barn walls. Her heart leapt into her mouth, thumping wildly. She heard scrambling and rustling hay and looked over to where Toby had jumped awake. His face was white with fear…he didn't even flinch as he looked over to see Mr. Todd laying entwined on top of her. He scrambled over and put his hands on Mr. Todd's shoulders, shaking them both.

"What's 'appening?" he cried frantically. "What's 'appening??"

Before Nellie could so much as open her mouth Mr. Todd has sprang back to life. He jerked his head up and tore away from her so quickly she yelped in shock. The barber rolled aside and staggered to his feet, swaying slightly with a hand on his head.

"Mr. Todd??" she asked, sitting bolt upright, her eyes fixed on his back.

He didn't turn around. She stared for a split-second at the back of his head, the wild, dark spray of his mussed hair. He stood there for one instant in total silence. Then, without so much as glancing back at either of them, he had slid down the ladder to the hayloft and was running from the barn, throwing the wooden door open and bursting outside into the blinding white daylight.

"_Sweeney!" _Nellie screamed. Without hesitating an instant she stumbled to her feet, biting her lip and ignoring the overwhelming dizziness that immediately swamped her. She refused to let herself fall.

_Stand up, damn it! STAND UP!_

"Stop it!" Toby was shouting. "Mum, you're goin to fall!!"

"Stay here Toby!" she cried, her face set in livid determination as she swayed on her feet, taking lopsided steps toward the ladder.

"No! I won' let you…"

"_STAY HERE!" _Nellie screamed, shooting him a fiery gaze that stopped the boy dead in his tracks. She didn't say another word to him as she found the first rung of the ladder and clutched it for dear life, squeezing her eyes shut to keep herself from fainting with dizziness as she made her way down. Her feet hit the floor of the barn and she didn't look back…running with as much speed as she was capable, the entire world spinning all around her, she tore outside, her bear feet plunging into the snow.

The slap of the cold on her face was like a burst of clarity. She blinked, a good portion of the hot fuzziness immediately wiped clean from her head and her vision clearing. She steadied herself on her feet and her eyes immediately fell on the small farmhouse sitting not two hundred yards away, and off to the left of it, in the wide yard in front of it, in the snow, stood Mr. Todd. He was standing just a few feet away from a strange man, the two of them regarding each other in frozen stillness.

Nellie lifted her skirts and ran, the thin streams of tears running back her temples already frozen. She gasped for air, fighting the sobs that worked their way from her throat in spite of her efforts.

She didn't know what was going on. She knew only one thing.

_Mr. Todd._

At last she drew close to them. She slowed to a halt a few yards from them, her chest heaving. Her eyes fixed first on Mr. Todd…he was standing there, his body tensed as if ready to spring forward at any moment, his expression completely unreadable, his eyes fixed on the stranger standing just a few paces away. Nellie looked at the strange man, and for a moment her eyes honed in on his face, racking her brain furiously. He looked familiar. She had seen him somewhere before, she was sure of it. But where…?

Then, she saw it…it was clutched in his hand, held out in front of him like a shield, shaking as he trembled violently. The sun played on it's silver handle, the light flashing and dancing up and down the blade every time it moved.

It was Jack…the thief, Jack, who had robbed them in the village two nights ago. In the light of day, he looked twice as gaunt, emaciated, and filthy as he had in the dark…his eyes were bloodshot and wild, darting back and forth between she and Mr. Todd. His lips were pulled back from his grimy teeth, and he was panting even harder than Nellie. He looked like a cornered animal, holding Mr. Todd's razor out in front of him as if hoping the mere sight of it would be enough to scare them off.

Nellie then caught sight of something just out of her periphery…she turned and looked at the doorway to the little farmhouse, no more than ten yards to her right. The door was hanging open, revealing a glimpse of the homey, rustic little cabin inside. Laying crumpled over the threshold, her body propping the door open, her limbs splayed limply in different directions and the pale grey of her worn, patched skirts mussed and hitched up around her bare legs, was a woman. She was young, perhaps even fifteen or twenty years younger than Nellie. Her long, honey-brown hair was fanned out to one side of her head, trailing in the snow. Nellie took a few steps nearer to her and stopped. The breath caught in her chest and she couldn't move, couldn't look away. The girl was dead. Nellie couldn't see much of what her face looked like, because the entire right side of it was blasted away. Blood was splattered all over the door, over the snow, over her clothes, seeping into her hair. Bits of skull and gore were lying just at the end of Nellie's vision inside the house. The long, dark, metallic shape of a rifle was lying nearby, sunken in the snow. In the post of the door beside the girl's body were two bullet holes, bitten deep into the wood.

_The other two shots._

Nellie lifted a hand to her mouth. Any other woman would have been sick on the spot. Not her. All she felt was a cold, hollow emptiness, as if all of her insides had disappeared. And that was infinitely worse.

Her hand still clasped over her mouth, fresh tears welling in her eyes, Nellie turned and looked back at Mr. Todd and Jack. They hadn't moved. For one long, hideous moment, time seemed to stand still between the three of them. Jack was looking back and forth between them, and the dead girl in the doorway. The look on his filthy face said it all. He knew his guilt, and he knew that they knew it, and in one instantaneous, terrified frenzy, he had completely lost his senses.

Nellie swallowed. She took a single step forward.

Jack's wild, frantic eyes darted to her, and when he saw her approaching, he lost all vestiges of control. He flew into a desperate panic, screaming haggardly and charging at Mr. Todd.

"_Look out!" _Nellie shrieked.

The razor flashed. Jack swiped and slashed with it wildly, flailing and attacking after Mr. Todd like a drunken lunatic. The barber jumped to the side, slipping out of reach just as the gleaming blade swiped, _ssssssssing,_ through the air. Jack roared and snarled, following after him and swinging blindly with the razor. Nellie backed away, watching in open-mouthed horror as the two of them dodged around each other, Jack lumbering crazily and Mr. Todd jumping and ducking, his steps growing weaker and more haphazard the longer he ran. Nellie was frozen, helplessly transfixed. She tried desperately to move, to say his name, but she was completely paralyzed.

Jack slashed. Mr. Todd stumbled back. Suddenly_, _he lost his footing, uttering a snarl of negation as he fell to his back in the snow. Nellie cried out, her shrill voice echoing in the still winter air. Jack was upon him instantly, tackling him and brandishing his weapon, pushing the razor to his neck. Mr. Todd struggled violently, seizing hold of Jack's wrist and wrestling against it with all his might, holding it still. The razor was immobilized between their opposing strength, their hands trembling, Jack's teeth clenched in murderous terror and Mr. Todd's clenched in puffing, grinding struggle.

Nellie's eyes fixed on the gleaming razor. Then, without even thinking, with the speed of lightning, her gaze shot over to the rifle lying in the snow.

She didn't stop to think. She just moved. She ran to the rifle and seized it, caught off guard by its surprising weight. She grappled with it in her arms, her breath rushing in and out audibly, her arms trembling and tears running down her cheeks. She turned away from the dead, gory wreck of the poor girl in the doorway and leveled the rifle with her shoulder, struggling to hold it steady. She shut one eye, peering down the barrel and through the sights. The nose of the gun bobbed and ducked wildly with her shaking…she bit her lip so hard it drew blood, forcing as much tension into her back and shoulders as was physically possible.

_One shot…just one shot…._

She fixed the barrel of the rifle at her target. Jack's head weaved in and out of her sights, just inches back and forth and where it needed to be. She had to have him exactly in line…if she flinched, if her aim was off, even the slightest fraction, she could hit Mr. Todd.

Nellie swallowed. _You can do this._

_You have to._

With one enormous groan of effort, Mr. Todd poured the last ounce of his strength into his arms and pushed Jack away from him, lifting him up just a few precious inches.

His head came into the sights of the rifle. Nellie's finger instantly curled on the trigger and squeezed.

_**PAAUUCCHH!**_

The kickback of the rifle was so violent it jerked her backward and she fell to the ground. The gun dropped from her arms, her strength all but completely spent. Her shoulder throbbed and pulsed in waves of heat, already going numb from the bruising force of the shot. She grabbed it in one hand, squeezing it and shutting her eyes against the pain. She was breathless and hollow inside. Trembling like she'd never trembled before, Nellie weakly staggered to her feet, looking up to the spot where Jack and Mr. Todd lay in the snow.

Jack's body lay limply on top of Mr. Todd, the great, fleshy bullet-hole ripped in the top of his skull gushing blood. The red fluid trickled out in a thick stream, pouring over Mr. Todd's shoulders and soaking his shirt. Mr. Todd grunted, heaving the body off of him and to the side. It flopped lifelessly in the snow and lay there, unmoving. The razor hung loosely in Jack's dead fingers.

Slowly, shakily, his breath rasping in and out, Mr. Todd stood up. For a moment, his back was to her, his shoulders hunched with exhaustion, rising and falling as he struggled to regain his breath. The left sleeve of his white shirt was painted crimson from the shoulder to the elbow, and when he slowly turned around, she saw that the blood was staining his entire chest and neck, making the pale white of his face appear even paler. The sight of him made Nellie burst into loud, fervent sobs.

Never in her life had she seen someone look more shaken. He looked as if he had been touched by the hand of Death itself.

Nellie ran to him. She flung herself at him and threw her arms around his neck, crying like she had never cried before. He stood stock still, his arms hanging down at his sides. For a long moment, they stood like that, with no sounds but Nellie's choking, gasping sobs. She squeezed him harder than she had known she could squeeze someone. Jack's wet blood soaked into the sleeves of her dress, got on her face, her neck, her chest. She didn't even notice. She wanted to swallow him, absorb him, suffuse his body straight into hers. She couldn't feel enough of the solidity of his shoulder's, the mass of his chest, the circumference of his neck. He was alive. He was there.

_Sweeney. Sweeney. Sweeney, _she cried silently, over and over again.

_Oh God. I thought I was going to….I thought you were…._

_Oh God, Sweeney. I was so scared._

She didn't know how much time had passed when she felt him gently place his hands on her shoulders and push her away from him. She looked up into his face, her eyes bleary with tears and her nose running. She sniffed repeatedly, still shaking and uttering delicate sobs from her quivering lips.

"Oh Mr. Todd," she cried, her voice barely audible. "Oh Mr. Todd…"

His face was blank. Completely blank. Gone was the white, trembling fear she had seen in him the moment after he'd stood up. Gone was the sheer, unadulterated horror. He was blank. Empty. His eyes were like dark, staring pools of ink. Every part of him looked utterly lifeless.

Calmly, without saying a single a word, Mr. Todd walked away from her, towards the crumpled body of Jack lying on its side, the snow around him painted red and melting from the heat of his steaming blood. Nellie watched as Mr. Todd bent down and picked up the razor, sliding it gently out from between Jack's fingers.

Nellie lifted her hand and held it clutched over her heart.

"Mr. Todd," she whispered, her voice just barely carrying across the distance between them. "I…I…."

_I love you, _she wanted to say. The words choked in her throat, and in spite of everything, everything that had just happened, so quickly…she felt herself smiling.

_He's alive. That's all that matters. Thank God…he's alive._

Mr. Todd held the razor at the level of his waist, looking down at it. His blank eyes stared at it for a moment as if he didn't know what it was. He slowly ran one finger down the length of the blade. Nellie watched him, her faint smile widening slightly as more tears ran from her eyes….but this time, they were tears of sheer relief.

_The man I love is alive._

Mr. Todd looked up at her. Her smiled flickered just the smallest bit when his eyes met hers. His eyes…they were so empty, so utterly empty. They were like windows into an endless black void.

"Mr. T?" she said quietly.

He spoke.

"Eleanor."

Her heart stopped. Her hand closed into a fist over her heart, her nails biting the skin. Her eyes widened.

_No._

"I'm sorry, Eleanor."

_No. _

"I hope…one day…you can be saved."

"_BENJAMIN, NO!" _

Before she could take the first step towards him, he had lifted the razor to his neck. His gaze was fixed on hers, blank, still, and perfectly calm. The thin blade gleamed, the silver flashing, bright and beautiful, in the yellow glare of the midday sun.

She watched as he sank the razor into his skin and slowly dragged it from right to left across his throat.

She stopped, one arm reached forward, frozen in midair. The only movement was the tears as they ran from her eyes.

His throat opened and blood…his red blood…poured out from between the separated flesh. It ran down the front of him. It dripped from the razor and stained the snow at his feet.

Nellie stood there. She couldn't move. She couldn't.

He dropped slowly forward onto his knees. He sank down into the snow, sitting upright, still looking at her.

His dark eyes softly closed.

And the emptiness vanished from her sight.

A/N; Geez oh man, angst to the max. Ok, I'm not going to give anything away, but for anyone who might be slightly shaken after that, I just want to say…_don't panic. _And for anyone who may be slightly confused ( understandable ), don't worry, everything will be explained in I'll be able to update sooner this time. Reviews make me smile! Smile, hell, who am I kidding, I'm a freaking review _junkie. ^.^_


	20. Chapter 20

A/N; Ok, so I'm not going to mince words on this one._ I realize it's been almost a whole freaking month_ since I last updated, and I wouldn't be surprised ( and wouldn't blame you ) if most of you have basically forgotten about this fic by now. Let me say exactly seven words in my defense. COLLEGE FINALS AND FANFICTION DO NOT MIX. I've been super-busy for a long while now, and I'm going to be super-busy over the next two weeks, so this little chapterette may be all I have to offer for some time. But good news, everyone! After finals, I'll have an _entire month _with _no school _and_ no homework!!! _( insert trumpets and hallelujah chorus here. ) So I may _actually_ be able to _finish this freaking thing!!_

Disclaimer; I don't own Sweeney Todd. You don't own Sweeney Todd. We should date.

Chapter 20

_Alive at Last_

White. Everywhere. Nothing but white.

He couldn't see anything. Everything was a blank sheet of endless white.

But no, it wasn't white. As he looked at it a moment longer, he realized it was more of a pearl gray. And it wasn't perfect, either, it fluxed from shade to shade in certain places, and there were nearly intangible lines where the clouds were breaking far away.

Oh, then it was the sky.

He was dead then.

He blinked. Twice.

_Dead. _

_So this is what's it's like? To be dead?_

_Hell is colder than I would have thought._

But wait.

If he was dead, how could he feel the cold?

He blinked a third time.

Blinking? That meant his eyes were open.

He tried to move. His body was almost completely numb, but he could curl his fingers slightly, and he could turn his head just the slightest bit to the side.

_His head._

The instant he turned it, he felt it….the most indescribably sensation he had ever experienced. It wasn't pain. It was beyond pain, beyond any one word's definition. It was the sensation of his skin sliding against itself, wet, slippery, separating, lacerated. The blood wet his skin and made the winter air whisper that much colder against it. He curled the fingers of his other hand. They were still clasped around something cold and thin and metallic. He opened his mouth to speak, but all that escaped were wet, guttural gasps and a small gurgling sound. His pressed his empty hand down and it dug deep into the snow.

_The snow. He could feel it. It crunched, freezing cold, melting between his fingers._

_Then he was really alive?_

_How? How was that possible?_

He suddenly felt something, just faintly, through the bones of his knees. Tremors, vibrations. Light footsteps, pounding swiftly toward him. They lasted only an instant before she crashed down on the ground in front of him. Slowly, he let his head fall forward and look at her. Her face filled his vision, yet he didn't really see her…it was as if he was watching her through a window, as if she weren't real. He couldn't even make out her expression. The only things he could see clearly were her hands, hovering out between them, edging closer and then further away again, as if she couldn't decided where it was safe to touch him. He wanted to speak, but whenever he flexed his vocal chords, the only sound he heard was the same faint sputtering, and more blood seeped from the horizontal slice over his throat.

_Nellie. I'm alive, _he wanted to say. _My eyes are open. _

But he couldn't. He couldn't speak, couldn't move. He was paralyzed by something invisible all around him, but all the while his thoughts were racing as quickly as his swiftly failing consciousness allowed.

_How can I possibly still be alive?_

And then, he heard it. Somewhere deep down, deep inside him, resonating like an echo. A voice, screaming, wailing, cursing violently.

_NO! NO NO NO! _

If his body were an empty room, the owner of the voice would be pounding their fists on the walls between every word.

_NO _BANG_ NO _BANG _NO!!!! _BANG BANG BANG.

Sweeney narrowed his eyes, his vision still foggy and surreally empty. The voice continued to shriek furiously, and as he listened to it, for no real reason that he could quite place, he felt himself smile inwardly. Somewhere far in the distance, he could suddenly hear Mrs. Lovett's voice screaming his name, but the words were too faint for him to make out. He was slipping closer and closer into unconsciousness with every passing second and every draining teaspoon of precious blood, but he mustered his final ounces of strength to mutter something to the wailing voice as his eyelids slowly closed.

_Nice try, Barker._

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

"Sweeney. Sweeney. Sweeney."

His eyes were open, staring straight at her. They were like empty black pools of ink. He blinked and swallowed over and over again, his entire body trembling, somehow rigid and limp at the same time.

Nellie repeated his name in a monotone. Her eyes had stopped tearing, her heart had stopped pounding. A terrifying kind of calm had seized hold of her.

"Sweeney. Sweeney. Look at me."

He was alive. He shook, his eyes watching her but clearly not seeing her. Her hands hovered nervously, trembling violently as they moved around his neck. She had to do something…blood was continuing to run down from the slice in his throat…but she was petrified. She was afraid that if she so much as touched him he would slip away from her.

Nellie's mind…_always so practical, always so clear, so level-headed and sharp_….had gone completely blank. From the instant she had watched the razor slide through him, it was as if everything had been wiped clean and ceased to exist, and now she was floating in oblivion, unable to get her feet back down to the ground. And so she hovered, and said his name. Over and over.

"Sweeney, no. No. Sweeney. _Sweeney."_

His eyelids began to flicker more heavily, his head slowly tilting back to point towards the sky again. Her pupils dilated. His white skin was getting whiter by the second. Somewhere deep inside her something jerked, a spark, a scratch, a burst of flame. _Move, _it told her. _Move before he dies._

His eyes closed.

_No, no, no, no….do something…do something…._

It was like all of her nerves had been detached. Her eyes were fixed on the bleeding cut, unable to look away, unable to snap herself out of the trance.

_Fucking idiot, __**do **__something! WHILE HE'S STILL ALIVE!_

His head tilted all the way back, and that was when she saw it. When his neck elongated so that the sides of the slice in his throat spread apart, opening the cut into a diamond-seed shape. Like a rock falling back to earth, Nellie's brain was pulled back into coherence. Her eyes narrowed and she leaned closer, peering into the wound. Her heart jumped and sped into overdrive. The fire inside her erupted. She wanted to scream. She wanted to kiss him. She wanted to sing, she wanted the tears to burst from her eyes and never stop. Everything was immediately clear. She cursed herself for being such a fool, for letting herself be made so useless by a single moment of horror.

Nellie had never counted Mr. Todd's victims. She had not the faintest clue just how many dead bodies she had disposed of in the last year, but one thing was certain….she had seen enough slit throats in her day to know what a fatal cut looked like. And as she stared at the bleeding wound on Sweeney's throat, she saw something that she had never seen in any of the throats he had cut.

_White. _The pinkish white of his windpipe. And the tubes, the tube-like muscles…darker pink, on the far ends of the laceration. The pink and the white…they were both there. They hadn't been cut. She didn't know how it was possible, but the razor hadn't gone the last, tiniest _fraction _of an inch deep enough to slice through his trachea or either of his carotid arteries.

_How?_

Slowly, Nellie's gaze moved down to his right hand. His fingers were curled limply around the silver handle of his razor. She reached down and slid it from his hand, lifting it up to her face. She took her thumb and carefully wiped the blood away. She stared down at the gleaming silver in silent disbelief. While it was in Jack's possession, the blade of the razor had been misused and nearly ruined beyond repair. It was dull and worn, the edge bitten up with nicks and tiny chinks in the delicately sharpened silver. That was why it hadn't cut deeply enough, why Benjamin had failed. By the most unimaginable odds in the world….he had been saved. Nellie found herself silently mouthing words she had never thought she would utter.

_But for the grace of God…._

She lowered the razor and looked back at Sweeney's throat. As she stared, transfixed, into the open wound, a strange, billowing kind of buoyancy rose up inside her, made of equal parts the desperate urgency the she act, _now…._and sheer, unbelievable relief, sweeter than she had ever known it in all her life. Until this moment, she had not known the _meaning _of relief.

For just an instant, she let her eyes fall closed and drink in the sensation….the sweet, impossible relief that rushed through her body like a liquid. Her hands had stopped hovering. She reached out and put them on the sides of Sweeney's face, cradling his jaw. Just an instant, a fleeting second in time, so she would know…._really know…._that he was still there.

And then, it was over.

She moved faster than she had ever moved. In the blink of an eye the hem of her dress had been ripped off. Like a flash of lightning, she had gently tilted Sweeney's head forward until the edges of the laceration touched each other, and then she had wound the strip of fabric around his throat tight enough to hold the cut closed and stop the bleeding, but loose enough not to constrict his breathing. She muttered under her breath as she worked, thanking heaven that his center of gravity was aligned so that even in unconsciousness he remained erect on his knees.

She was tying the ends of the makeshift bandage together when Toby came towards them. He had a hundred questions burning in his wide eyes, his gaze darting back and forth between Nellie and Mr. Todd, both in blood-drenched clothes, and the two dead, gruesomely blasted bodies lying in the snow…first Jack, and then the girl in the doorway. His face drew slowly in abject horror, but before he could say a single word, Nellie had seized him by the wrist and firing off orders.

"At 'is feet, Toby."

He opened his mouth to speak and she cut him off.

"_At 'is feet!"_

Toby's jaw clamped shut, and he hurriedly obeyed. Always keeping her hands braced on Sweeney's shoulders, Nellie stood up and moved behind him. Gently, but swiftly, she pulled him back and straightened his legs out so that he lay flat on the ground.

"Take 'is feet. We're carrying 'im to the 'ouse."

Toby bent his knees and secured his grip firmly around Sweeney's ankles, and Nellie hooked her hands underneath his arms and took a deep breath, bracing herself.

"Alright, on three. One, two, _three!"_

The two of them growled loudly with effort as they heaved Sweeney off the ground. They pedaled furiously toward the farmhouse, taking short, rapid steps and covering as much ground as possible…but even so, they were forced to stop and rest twice to keep from dropping him. At last they reached the doorway, but Toby stopped cold when they came upon the mangled body of the girl. His face twisted and he stared in horrified stupor at the poor creature.

"M-m-mum…m-mum…she's…sh-she's…."

"Don't look, Toby!" Nellie ordered, her voice catching slightly even as she struggled to keep it strong. She knew no child should ever have to see the things her dear Toby had been forced to see…but there was nothing they could do. They had to get Sweeney inside.

"Just keep your 'ead up," she said sternly, steeling herself against the gory sight. "Look at me, Toby, alright? Just look up at my face. That's a boy. Now, last one, on three….one, two, _three!"_

With one final surge of determination, they carried Sweeney over the threshold of the house, with no choice but to step on the body of the girl as they went. Once inside, they hurriedly wobbled him over to the first available place they saw, which was a dingy, worn looking sofa near the fireplace, and carefully laid him down, his head rolling limply to the side. The farm house was small and plain, with a single large room that contained a kitchen, a hearth, and a few rustic scraps of furniture. At one end of the room, a short hallway led to two other doors. Nellie immediately ran back to the door, side-stepping around the girl and back once more into the pale winter day. She cast about wildly, her eyes scanning the ground until she found it…the rifle. She seized it and ran back inside as quickly as its weight would allow. Then, finally, she swallowed, held her breath, and dragged the dead body of the girl by her feet out into the snow, gritting her teeth and forbidding herself to so much as wince at the sight of her ripped open skull. She let the body drop, then ran back into the house and slammed the door shut, putting her back to it and letting the air rush out of her lungs. She coughed, covering her mouth. The acrid, sickening smell of blood was everywhere.

When she looked up, she saw Toby kneeling beside Mr. Todd, eyes fixed in mixture of fear and utter confusion at the bandage around his neck. He looked up at her, his face sickly white, his body trembling.

"Is Mr. Todd dead?" he whispered hoarsely, his voice quivering.

Those four small words melted Nellie's heart. She practically ran across the room, pulling Toby abruptly to his feet and seizing him in her arms. He buried his face in her chest and hugged her back, ignoring the still-tacky blood covering her front, and for a moment they stood there, silently holding each other. Nellie pressed her mouth into the crown of his head, willing away the threatening tears stinging behind her eyes.

"No. O' course not," she answered, sniffing once. "Silly thing, you should know better. Mr. Todd won't ever leave us."

Toby nodded against her, and she could hear the muffled sounds of his crying. She squeezed her eyes shut, sniffed once more, wiped her face with her hand, and took him by the shoulders, holding him out at arm's length. The moment she saw his face she knew was going to be sick…he was positively grey at the temples, his jaw quivering and tears smearing his eyes. Giving him a final look of reassurance, she gently guided him across the room and down a small hallway. She peered into the first open door on her left; mercifully, it was a bedroom.

""Ere, Toby," she whispered, steering him softly inside. "You go an' lay down. Jus' lay down an' rest for as long as you like."

He coughed and sniffled. "But…what about M-Mr…."

"I'll take care of Mr. T. Go an' lay down, love."

He nodded, shuffling inside, and she waited until he had curled up on the bed before turning away and hurrying back to the other room.

A/N; Ok, I'll be the first to say it. That's an extremely crappy place to end this chapter. But to be frank with you, I just wanted to post what I had already done. I think I'm going to try writing shorter chapters and hopefully uploading them more often. I know there are a ton of questions that still need answering, and I was going to cover them in this chapter, but like I said, I was eager to get _something _posted, so I decided to wait until next time. Please review, even if you totally hated it! ( I gotta admit, I'm worried that the way I let Sweeney live might be kind of a cheap way out…) I'm slowly getting better at dealing with bad reviews, so don't be shy. ( puts goggles over eyes ) _Hit me!_


	21. Chapter 21

A/N; I have one thing to say. HALLE--FREAKING--LUJAH!! My finals are _over!! I survived! I can actually __**finish this story now!**_

Disclaimer; You don't own Sweeney Todd. I don't own Sweeney Todd. But I'm perfectly ok with that right now because, did I mention? ( inhale ) MY FINALS ARE OVER! _Suck it, first semester! Ha!_

Chapter 21

_I Had Him!_

or

_We Already Are_

"_All things considered, an excellent academic performance. Sincerely excellent."_

"_Thank you, sir," a twenty-two-year-old Howard Connor smiled, bowing his head, turning to look at each of the deans in turn. A great swell of ecstasy was bubbling, boiling up inside of him. After months and months of studying and testing, __**years **__of applying and being rejected again and again, he was finally, finally, __**finally **__going to be accepted into the college of law at Oxford University. "Thank you. You've no idea how long I've---"_

"_However."_

_Howard's smile flickered. He swallowed, clutching his hat in his hands, staring up into the paunchy, wrinkled face of the dean of law seated at the center of the high, half-circle pulpit in front of him. He felt his heartbeat hasten._

"_Is…is there a…problem, sir?"_

_The dean lowered his spectacles further down his hooked nose and peered thinly over them at Howard._

"_To be frank, Mr. Connor, there is. Your test scores, you see, are magnificent. Some of the highest we've seen this year. Your recommendations are credible, your degrees are in order, and it is obvious that you know the foundations of law backward and forward. But there is one grievous issue with your court manner."_

_Howard swallowed again, thickly. A faint perspiration had begun to form around his throbbing temples._

"_My…court manner, sir?"_

"_Yes, I'm afraid so. You've taken part in several trials recently as an apprenticing law student, have you not? And under three different mentors from the college?"_

_Howard's hands began to tremble faintly. "Y-yes, sir, I have."_

"_Each of them has made the same remark on their evaluations of your ability."_

_Howard leaned forward ever so slightly. The dean cleared his throat and lifted a sheet of paper to his eyes._

"_According to your mentors, Mr. Connor, you have quite the temper. An "uncontrollable" temper. And when that temper is aroused ( and it all too often __**is**__, according to your marks ) you make mistakes. Grave, irreparable mistakes. One evaluation went so far as to say that if left solely to your own devices, you would not only have lost the case through your angry errors, but would have humiliated the firm and tarnished its credibility to all present at the trial."_

_Howard stared. The lines of the old man's face had become blurred. They swam in front of his eyes like a pasty hallucination. The bottom of his stomach dropped out. He could only mutter one word through his disbelieving lips._

"_S-sir?"_

"_I'm sorry, young man, but the college of Oxford law has no place for students who are unable to maintain their composure in court. Your application is denied. You may file it again next year, and in the meantime I suggest you learn to control your temper. Please send the next applicant in on your way out."_

"Sir?"

Beadle Connor stood, staring off into the distance. The fierce winter wind whipped his cape and set his mustache into a dancing flurry. His grip on the amber hilt of his cane tightened as the words seemed to echo in his mind, as clear and sharp as the report of gunshot, even after the passage of more than twenty-five years.

_You make mistakes. Grave, irreparable mistakes._

"Sir? Beadle Connor, sir?"

_I suggest you learn to control your temper._

"Beadle Connor, sir!"

The Beadle snapped out of his reverie and whipped his head toward the small constable standing beside him.

"_WHAT?" _he snarled viciously.

The constable flinched, licking his lips nervously. "We…we…well, sir it's just that…we…."

"_Spit it out!" _the Beadle demanded, his lip curling and revealing sharp rows of clenched, grinding teeth.

The constable swallowed visibly. "We…we can't find their trail anywhere, sir."

The Beadle blinked. "What did you say?"

The constable's face slowly began to blanch, and his voice stammered helplessly. "Well, the dogs, s-sir…they can't pick up the scent anywhere…they lost it back at the---"

"AT THE RIVER, I know, I am not an _idiot, _constable!" the Beadle spat furiously. "Which is more than I can say of you and your _pathetic _officers! The dogs lost the scent into the river _three fucking miles back! _How far through the water could they have possibly walked, in _this weather, _and fighting fatigue?? They must have gotten out _somewhere! _What about footprints? Surely you don't need the damn dogs to find _those!"_

"W-well you s-see, sir…as far as f-footprints go…the snow is so dry out here on the plains, the wind would have swept away any sign of tracks they might have made."

Beadle Connor blinked, turned away from the constable, and lifted his hand to his chin, massaging it as if deep in thought.

"So what you are saying to me, constable," he said quietly, calmly. "Is that we have searched this miserable countryside for a full twenty-four hours, and have come up completely empty-handed. We have no idea where they are. And we have no further means of tracking them."

The poor constable gulped audibly, and nodded his head. "I-I'm afraid so….sir."

"Hmmm. I see."

The Beadle calmly lifted his cane off the ground, holding it at the middle of the shaft, turning it in his hands, inspecting it. He examined the amber head, breathed on it, and polished it with the heel of his glove.

The constable watched, waiting, terrified. "Ah….sir?"

The Beadle turned and looked at him.

_CRACK!_

A sickening sound, like the packing of meat against breaking bones, echoed through the still, frozen air. The other constables jumped, every eye turning toward the source of the horrific sound. The horses whinnied in fear and pawed the ground and had to be calmed down again by the drivers. The constable lay sprawled on the ground, steaming hot blood pouring from his mouth, his cheek swelling rapidly where the rock-hard amber hilt had clubbed him in the face.

The Beadle retracted his cane, lifting it once again in front of his eyes. He took a silk handkerchief from his breast pocket and meticulously wiped the blood away from the amber stone. He looked down at the constable, who moaned softly as his cringed to his side in the snow. He rolled his jaw and spat bloody teeth onto the ground. Beadle Connor stepped over the fallen man and approached the group of officers, each of whom was now staring at him in shocked silence.

"Officer Langdon," the Beadle barked, and one of the policeman timidly stepped forward.

"Y-yes, Beadle Connor?"

"Where is our prisoner?"

"Which prisoner, sir?"

The Beadle eyed him sharply, causing him to flinch.

"Jack Bonnegen, you _fool."_

"He's, ah…in the second wagon, sir."

Without another word, Beadle Connor strode towards the second wagon, pushed aside the officer guarding it, fiddled a key in the padlock, and flung open the door. Muffled sounds of protest issued from within the wagon as Jack was seized by the neck of his clothes and dragged outside. Beadle Conner tossed him to the ground like a rag doll, brandishing his cane and pressed the sharp end of it against Jack's neck. The thief whined loudly, struggling helplessly in the snow, his hands shackled behind him.

"What'd I do _now?" _he moaned, breaking into a choked cry as the Beadle pushed the cane further into his windpipe.

"Where were they going?" the Beadle demanded shortly.

Jack blinked. "Oo?…._Aaahhh!" _he yelped in pain as the tip of the cane ground in tighter.

"You _know _who, you _fucking _piece of _trash! Sweeney Todd, _the man you robbed, the man whose razor you _stole! Where was he going??"_

"I don' know!" Jack wailed, wriggling and thrashing futilely against the cane. "I told yeh, I _don' know nuffing!"_

"_LIAR! WHERE WAS HE HEADED??"_

Jack issued a gasping scream which ended in a fit of choked coughing. "I DON' KNOW!" he roared with his last ounce of breath.

Beadle Connor snarled furiously and pulled the cane away. Jack rolled to his side, hacking and sputtering.

"Officer!" the Beadle shouted, and one of the policeman hastily came forward.

"Yes, sir?"

"Release this useless whelp of a whore. He's of no further use to me."

The constable blinked, confused. "But…but sir, he's under arrest! He's to be taken back to…"

The Beadle spun around, a embers of flame burning in his eyes. "I SAID RELEASE HIM! I'LL NOT HAVE HIM WASTING ANY MORE OF MY TIME AND THE TIME OF THIS INVESTIGATION!"

The constable immediately obeyed, his eyes flitting nervously to the cane clutched tightly in the Beadle's fist, and then to the poor man who was just rising to his feet, his hand clutched over his broken mouth and blood trickling down his chin. Jack's eyes searched wildly as his handcuffs were unlatched behind him; the instant he was free, he scrambled to his feet, gasping for air, his gaze wild and terrified like a frightened animal.

"And take this with you!" the Beadle sneered, reaching into his pocket and withdrawing the damaged silver razor that the dogs had been unable to draw Sweeney Todd's scent from. He threw it at Jack's face…it struck him in the forehead, and he caught it with fumbling fingers.

"_Take _it! Buy booze with it, and may the alcohol poisoning _kill _you and rid the world of your putrid stink!"

Jack lingered only an instant longer, staring incoherently at the Beadle, totally unable to comprehend the idea that he was actually being _let go…_and then, like a bird set free from a cage, he turned and fled as if hell itself was at his heels. He sped across the snow off towards the horizon, never once looking back until he had disappeared over the rolling hills.

The Beadle was breathing hard, his chest heaving and ragged. He turned and looked at the officers, all of whom were staring at him in blank silence. The Beadle bared his teeth menacingly, like a bulldog.

"What are you imbeciles _waiting for?? Start looking!! _They didn't disappear into thin air! They had to leave that river _sometime, _and when they did, they left a _trail! SO FIND IT!"_

The officers obediently jumped into activity, wrangling the dogs and offering them the letter to renew their hold on the scent, then frantically searching every inch of the river bank which they had already gone over a dozen times. The Beadle stood there, watching, his nostrils flared and his mustache rippling with every intake of breath. He stormed over to his hansom and threw open the door, climbing inside. The moment he entered, Anthony Hope and his wife jumped, seizing hold of each other and staring at him with wide, terrified eyes. He barely noticed them. He gripped the head of his cane with both hands, staring out the window, his lips curling, muttering to himself. Try as he might, he couldn't force the echoing words of the dean of law out of his head. They replayed, over and over, the chime of a bell that would never stop wringing.

_You make mistakes._

_Grave, irreparable mistakes._

The Beadle grit his teeth, his hands twisting over the amber stone, his leather gloves squeaking, as if they too were cowering in fear.

_I'll find you, Sweeney Todd._

_I'll find you if it's the last fucking thing I do…_

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0

Jack Bonnegen had never run faster in his entire life. He hadn't even _known _he was able to run that fast. He tore across the snow-covered fields like a jackrabbit, never looking back, never stopping to rest. He just ran, ran as if his very life depended on it. And he didn't think twice about _where _to run, either. The instant he had been thrown out of the wagon, the instant he'd seen the familiar curve of the river and the familiar rise of the hills…he'd known where he was. And he'd known where he was headed.

It might have been midday before he reached it. He had no idea what time it was…all he knew was that the white winter sun was high overhead, casting his shadow short and dark beneath him as he stumbled over the snow. He stopped at the gate, collapsing on it, gasping for air, his breath puffing between his greasy lips in white clouds. He looked up, his eyes squinting in the blinding shine of the sun off the snow. There it was, inside the enormous ring of fence, sitting innocently at the top of a shallow hill. The little farmhouse…_his _farmhouse. The house his wife had died in…the house his daughter had been born in, with the same old creaking barn just standing on its last legs. When was the last time he had been here? Five months ago? Six months? A year? He couldn't remember. He pushed open the gate and staggered forward up the snow-covered path.

He fell against the door, exhausted, like a wet sack of mud. It creaked under his weight, but remained shut; it was latched from the inside. He was dizzy and reeling from his frantic run…his head was still pounding with the after effects of his night-long drinking binge more than a day earlier. Staggering upright, he blearily banged his fist on the door three times.

After a few moments of silence, he heard soft footsteps scuffling inside, and the door opened a tiny crack. One cold blue eye peered out, widened when it fell upon Jack's face, and immediately slammed the door shut again.

Jack groaned miserably, tossing his head back. "Lizzy!" he cried pathetically, banging on the door again with both fists. "C'mon, Lizzy, darlin'…open up!"

"_Go away!" _a small voice screamed shrilly from inside.

"Open n' door, sweet'eart! You've…you've _no idea _what I been frough…."

"I said _go away!" _she shrieked. "I never want to see you again!"

Jack leaned forward, thumping his forehead on the door, which only served to worsen his throbbing headache.

"You'd turn your own _father _out into the cold, Lizzy? Your own bloody _father?"_

"_You are NOT my father!" _the girl cried, tears evident in her voice.

Jack began to crumble. "Please, Lizzy…please, darlin'….I'll _die _if you leave me out 'ere…I'll die…."

There was a long, silent pause. Jack waited, heart pounding, lungs burning, shivering in the cold. After what felt like an eternity, the door gently cracked open. He immediately pushed it in, diving into the warmth of the cottage. He stumbled inside and collapsed on the first piece of furniture he came near…a sofa sitting by the hearth. Lizzy closed the door, turning to look at him, clutching her ratty shawl tighter around her as she slowly approached him. Her long honey-brown hair fell loose and tangled over shoulders, her blue eyes angry and wet with tears. She slowly sat down in a chair opposite him.

"How dare you," she muttered under her breath, glaring at him as he lay stretched on the sofa.

Jack groaned, rubbing his forehead with his hand. "Don't start on me wiv 'at, Lizzy, for Jesus' sake…don' you start on me wiv' 'at…"

"How _dare you," _she repeated, her voice quivering with hatred. "How _dare _you come here now, after all this time. How _dare you."_

"Aww, 'Lizabeth, my little butterfly…'ow can you say such fings to your old dad, after the 'orrible day 'e's 'ad?"

"_Horrible day?" _the girl cried incredulously. "And just what happened to you, hm? Run out of money to buy gin? Or did your precious _Vanessa _leave you again?"

"You leave 'er out o' this," Jack snapped, sitting up and narrowing his eyes at his teenage daughter. "You _know _'ow I feel about 'er. You was _young, _you needed a _mother…"_

"That slut was _never _my mother," Lizzy bit angrily, rising to her feet. "You never even _married her! _All _you _wanted to do was take all of our money and run off with her to _London _so you could…"

"_Shut it, _Lizzy! Shut yer mouf about fings you don' understand!"

"Oh, I understand!" she screamed, the tears running from her eyes once more. "I understand _perfectly! _She left you, and now you've come crawling back here on your hands and knees. You have _some nerve _coming around here! Where the hell have you _been _for _six months?? _Where's all the money you took? Spent it on _drinking, _I'm sure. Look at you…you're drunk right now, I can smell it on you!"

Jack groaned and covered his eyes. "For God's sake, Lizzy, stop your bloody _screamin'…"_

"_NO! _I want you _out of this house, NOW!"_

Jack opened his eyes. He slowly sat up, pinning his daughter with a penetrating, red-eyed glare.

"You jus' shut your mouf, Lizzy. You shut up right now. This is _my _'ouse."

"This is my MOTHER'S HOUSE!" Lizzy shrieked. "And if she could see what a _stinking good-for-nothing _you've become, she would _never…."_

"Your mother's _dead, _Lizzy," Jack shouted, staggering to his feet. "This is _my _fucking 'ouse. I built it when you was---"

"Out," Lizzy cried boldly, thrusting a pointed finger to the door. "Get out. I never want to see you here again."

Jack laughed viciously, taking a few steps toward her. "An' jus' oo's gonna make me, sweet'eart? _You?"_

Lizzy glared at him, raw hatred seething like snakes behind her eyes. She turned and stormed to the wall behind her, reached up, and seized a double-barrel shotgun from it's rack on the wall. She whirled around and aimed both barrels straight between Jack's eyes, her delicate body trembling from both the weight of the gun and the effort of holding in her furious sobs. The tears streamed from her glaring eyes.

"Calm down now, Lizzy," Jack muttered, lifting his hands and standing still as a statue. "Jus' calm down now. You're gettin' all worked up over nuffing."

"Get out," Lizzy sneered, the gun never flinching from it's target. "Get out now. Never come back."

"Now, now, Lizzy…butterfly, sunshine…it's _daddy…"_

_CHICK-CHICK. _The gun cocked loudly in her fingers.

"_GET OUT!!" _she shrieked.

Jack's insides turned to water at the cocking of the rifle. He kept his hands raised, slowly edging around the room towards to door, his bleary eyes fixed on the barrels of the gun as they followed his every move.

"Alrigh', alrigh'," he muttered softly, his hand slowly moved towards the doorknob. "I'm leavin,' Lizzy, I'm leavin.'"

He opened the door. A burst of winter wind gushed inside, ruffling the skirt of Lizzy's plain dress. Her jaw was set, her arms trembling as she held the gun steady. For a moment neither of them moved, and there was no sound but the gentle, invisible hush of the freezing wind.

"Lizzy, I swear, I didn' mean t'…."

"_LEAVE!"_

"I'm _goin', _I'm goin'…I jus'….I had jus' wanted to tell you…I love you, darlin.' You're all I got left in 'is 'ole ruddy world."

"I said _leave," _Lizzy hissed venomously.

Jack lowered his gaze and nodded. "Alrigh.' If that's what you want, darlin.'"

He turned and stepped through the doorway. He tilted his head ever so slightly to peer over his shoulder, glancing at Lizzy just out of his periphery. He took another small step over the threshold. The barrel of the gun lowered.

The instant he saw the nose of the rifle tilt downward, he whirled around and pounced. Lizzy screamed and tried to hoist the gun back up, but Jack was upon her in the blink of an eye…he seized the barrel in both hands, wrenching with all his might, but Lizzy clung to the rifle for dear life, his thin hands refusing to relinquish hold of it. They staggered together toward the door, wrestling over the rifle…they reached the doorway, and with a sharp growl of anger Jack mustered all his remaining strength and slammed Lizzy into the doorframe. Her temple struck the wood and she let out a piercing cry of pain. Her fingers loosened from the gun and Jack immediately wrenched it away, stumbling backward out into the bright sunlight. He raised the rifle, panting for breath….he caught a single flashing glimpse of Lizzy's blue eyes, wide and shining, her pale face gleaming in the light reflected from the snow….and then….

_**PAAUUCCHH! PAAUUCCHH! PAAUUCCHH!**_

It was all over before he even knew what was happening. As if it had a mind of it's own, the rifle had fired three times beneath his trembling fingers. The first two shots sank deep into the wooden frame of the door. The third was not so merciful. It hit Lizzy square in head, the sheer momentum knocking her onto her back in the blink of an eye. The right side of her skull exploded before his eyes, her blood splattering the door behind her. The report of the gunshots echoed, roaring like thunder, through the empty hills. Then everything went dead silent.

For one horrible, suspended moment, Jack simply stood and stared, blinking. It wasn't real. It couldn't be real.

It was.

The instant his senses returned to him, he dropped the rifle as if it were a live snake. It sank into the snow at his feet, and he stumbled backwards, backing away from the dead body of his daughter, his head shaking slowly back and forth. A violent trembling seized his entire body, and he was gripped by a fear greater than any he had ever known. He simply stood there, paralyzed, his eyes fixed on Lizzy's limp body lying across the threshold.

He barely even noticed the sound of the approaching footsteps up he looked up and the man was already there, standing less than ten yards away.

_No. It's wasn't possible._

It was him…the pale, dark-eyed stranger from that night in the village. The owner of the razors. The man that insane Beadle was searching for. _Sweeney Todd._

Less than three full minutes later, Jack Bonnegen was lying dead in the snow, his fingers curled around his stolen razor, a single bullet hole ripped through the top of his head. The last thing he saw was the terrifying white face of the strange man, his empty black eyes staring into his with an expression that was neither anger nor fear…and in the split second between the bullet dividing his brain and the black tide of death sweeping over him, a single thought ran fleetingly through Jack Bonnegen's mind.

_Sweeney Todd. I think you are the devil._

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

Nellie's eyes were hard and narrow, her lips pursed firmly. She forced herself to keep her hand steady and her heart calm as she carefully wound the needle and thread back and forth over Sweeney's lacerated throat. She had practically ransacked the entire farmhouse searching for the sewing supplies, and to her utter dismay all of the needles had been exasperating blunt. She could only pray that Sweeney truly was unconscious as he seemed, and that he couldn't feel the struggling pierce of the dull needle as it dug over and over through his skin.

After an agonizingly long half hour, she had finally made the last stitch and completely sealed the edges of his wound shut. She tied of the triple-thick length of thread, then took the single half-full bottle of gin she'd found in the house and gently cleaned the cut with it a final time, wiping away as much dried blood from his skin as she could. Then, when she had done everything she could possibly think to do, she put down her gin-soaked rag and looked at him, looked into his still, silent face.

_He was alive._

Through all of it, through every horror, every miserable moment, every cry of despair, every secret longing…through all of it, if she had nothing else, she had that pure, simple truth.

_He was alive._

Nellie couldn't suppress it. She didn't even try to. She leaned over and let her forehead rest against his, her hand gently cupping the side of his face, their nose almost brushing. She closed her eyes and let herself rest there, feeling the warmth of his skin radiating into hers, listening to his shallow breathing, feeling the heat of his breath against her face.

_If she had nothing else in the world….she still had this. He was __**alive.**_

Before she straightened completely, she had to do one more thing. She pressed her lips softly against his forehead, and allowed herself to linger there for a long, silent moment.

Then, Nellie heaved a great, heavy sigh, and sank down on the floor, her back to the sofa and Mr. Todd, and let her head fall into her hands. The small fire she had made in the hearth crackled and popped every few seconds, doing its best to cast a meager glow of heat into the room. It was faintly chilly nonetheless, and Nellie shivered lightly as she sat there, her eyes closed and her shoulders slumped.

_God in heaven…._

…_.what do we do now?_

Benjamin Barker was still alive. _Benjamin Barker was still alive. _And he had come so close…_so terrifyingly close to…._

She couldn't even finish the thought.

_Sweeney….her love…._

_How close had she come to losing him forever? How close…_

He lay behind her on the sofa, silent, his eyes closed in unconsciousness, his chest rising and falling gently. She didn't know what she would say to him when he woke up. She didn't know how she would be able to look into his eyes, those dark, wicked, beautiful eyes…those eyes that had gone empty and liquid in front of here, those eyes that had almost lost their last spark of light…

For once, the tears didn't threaten to come. Perhaps, after everything she had been through, she had finally reached the point where she had no more tears left to shed. The only thing that came to her now was a horrible hollow burning deep inside her body, a cavernous, swallowing emptiness she couldn't dispel. It made her want to sob dryly, to scream and cry out and exhaust her lungs completely. But she didn't. She only sat there, quietly, listening to the fire crackle.

"Mum?" a small voice called to her.

She looked up. It was Toby, standing at the other end of the room near the hallway that led to the bedroom.

She wanted to smile for him. She couldn't. She could only look at him with tired, weary eyes.

"Toby, love. Feel any better?"

He nodded softly. Then he held something up in his hands for her to see. It was a long-sleeved, burgundy-colored frock, very similar to the one she wore except that it's neck rose a bit higher, and it had a row of tiny buttons marching down the bodice.

"I…I found you a clean dress."

Nellie's heart throbbed with warmth, and if she'd had tears to shed, they would have fallen down her face in crystal streaks. She found the will to smile softly at him.

"Oh, Toby, darlin'. You're wonderful."

Toby nodded again, his face scrunching up…and all at once he broke down and ran across the room, letting the dress fall from his fingers as he dove down at Nellie's side and threw his arms around her. She held him closely, letting him hide his face against her chest. She rocked him gently and eased her fingers through his hair.

"Shhhh," she whispered, letting her eyes fall closed. "It's alright, love. Mr. Todd's doin' fine. Everythin's goin' to be alright."

Toby sniffed loudly. He mumbled something into her.

Nellie opened her eyes, hugging him gently. "What's that, Toby?"

He sniffed again, lifting his face just enough to make his broken voice audible.

"I love you, mum."

Nellie paused for a moment, then squeezed her eyes shut. She let her head rest against Toby's soft crown of hair. In spite of everything…she smiled, holding him closer against her.

"My boy. My little Toby."

He cried softly into her, and she shushed him gently.

"I love you too, Toby."

"Do you think," he muttered, sniffling between each word, "D'you think, mum…when this is all over….d'you think you, an' Mr. Todd…d'you think you could be…my parents?"

Nellie smiled again.

"Don' be silly, Toby," she whispered. "We already are."

_We already are._

A/N; Chapter 21. Voila. Sorry the plot didn't advance _too _much in this chapter...mostly I just wanted to explain all the craziness that happened in chapter 19. Now everybody's on the same page and we can actually get moving again. ^.^ Glad to be back! Reviews make me smile! ( as does the end of finals!! )


	22. Chapter 22

A/N; Mwaha! Chapter 22, ladies and gentleman. Have I mentioned how awesome it is not having any classes or homework to get in the way of writing fanfiction? ( which is much more important, of course ^_^ ) Hope you like this one…it the longest since chapter 19! ( cough cough, see Dojoghost? Taking your advice! "long and luscious and meaty," lol ) Enjoy!

Disclaimer; I don't own Sweeney Todd. You don't own Sweeney Todd. Let's discuss our mutual non-ownership of Sweeney Todd over eggnog.

Chapter 22

_Warm---and Clean---In My Hand_

or

_Here I Stand_

It was nearing twilight. The sun lingered lazily over the horizon like a deflating golden balloon, casting washes of orange and lavender light across the snowy fields. Very soon, it would be dark…and not just any darkness, but the complete, swallowing, Stygian blackness of the countryside, the consuming darkness that rendered virtually all activity impossible.

This thought, among others, was circling round and round in Beadle Connor's firing brain as he sat in his carriage, drumming his fingers impatiently on the shaft of his cane. Mr. and Mrs. Hope had not said a single word since he joined them in the coach, but then, he scarcely remembered they were there, anyway.

The police convoy rolled to a halt---as it had been doing precisely every ten minutes for the last several hours---and a there came a rapping knock on the door ( a knock decidedly less confident than it had been a few days ago---indeed, a few _hours _ago. The longer the investigation continued, the more fearful the other officers were becoming of Beadle Connor and his erratic surges of violent temper…the unfortunate constable he had attacked earlier was huddled in one of the other coaches, nursing a broken jaw and bloody, toothless gums as an ever-present reminder of what awaited them, should they further tax the Beadle's already rapidly thinning patience ). Needless to say, the knocking constable winced noticeably when the Beadle hastily flung open the door and leaned his head out.

"Anything??" he snarled, for perhaps the three hundredth time that day.

The constable grimly shook his head.

"Nothin', sir."

The Beadle growled and pounded his fist once against the wall of the couch, making the windows rattle and the Hopes curl even further back into their seat.

Beadle Connor's mind was racing and he ground his teeth, staring off into space. How was it possible? They had searched every last inch of this infernal river for almost seven miles. And they were on _horseback, _nonetheless…how could Todd possibly have outrun them, and left not so much as the _hint _of a trail to follow?

He couldn't have. It wasn't possible.

It simply wasn't.

_Then __**how **__in the bloody hell had he done it??_

_How could there be __**no **__scent to follow __**at all?**_

_Unless…._

The Beadle stopped. His eyes widened. He stopped grinding his teeth and became perfectly still, his lips parting minutely.

"Ah, sir?" the constable's voice rambled in the background. He paid it no mind.

_No scent to follow._

_None._

_It was impossible._

_Unless…._

…_.they were looking for the wrong scent._

"OFFICER!" the Beadle barked suddenly, causing the policeman to jump and immediately stand at attention.

"Y-yes, guv'nor?"

"The letter! The letter from Todd to Hope, give it to me!"

"Oh…the…letter? Well, sir, it's up with---"

"Then GO GET IT!"

"Right, sir, r-right away!" the officer hurried away, and moments later returned clutching the folded piece of paper in his gloved hands.

"_Give it to me!" _the Beadle snarled, snatching it and whipping it open with one swift flick of the wrist. He brought the paper close to his nose, peering down at it through incredulous half-lidded eyes. After a long moment of silent inspection, he slowly looked up, first at the constable, and then, for no real reason at all other than to instill them afresh with a chilling shiver of fear and recognition of who was in charge, at the Hopes. Anthony and his wife cringed beneath his gaze.

"Beadle Connor, sir?"

"_This is it!" _the Beadle nearly shrieked, overcome by the surging desire to laugh and smash something at the same time. "_It all makes sense! _Look at this script, constable! _Look at it!"_

"What about it?"

"_What about it?? _Don't you understand? Look at the curves! Look at the delicate loops of the L's and the E's and the Q's! Isn't it _obvious, _constable? This is the handwriting of a _woman!"_

The officer blinked, staring blankly. "A woman."

"Yes, you idiot, a _woman! _We gave this letter to the dogs to track the scent with…don't you see? All this time, we haven't been following _Todd's _trail at all! We've been following the trail of that _woman!"_

Anthony Hope's eyes suddenly widened a fraction. "Mrs. Lovett," he whispered under his breath.

Beadle Connor cackled triumphantly, nearly crumpling the paper in his fist in a sheer exclamation of joy.

"Ex_actly! Mrs. Lovett! HA!"_

"But, Mr….er….Beadle, sir, how does that help us? What shall we do now?"

"Don't you see, fool?? The dogs can't find Lovett's scent because she must not have left the river! Either she drowned in it, or Todd carried her out of it….either way, this letter is of no use to us now. We have to find a way of tracking _Todd himself."_

"But how? We haven't got anything of Todd's for the dogs to---"

"_Bonnegen!" _the Beadle practically screamed. "Jack Bonnegen! He robbed Sweeney Todd not two days ago! He _must _have something else of Todd's on him, he _must have. _Thieves like Bonnegen do not stop at stealing a single razor…we've simply to turn out his pockets, and I guarantee you we will find---"

"Uh…B-Beadle, sir…"

"_What?" _Connor snapped viciously at being interrupted.

The constable had all of a sudden gone very white. "It's just…you, ah….you released Jack Bonnegen earlier this morning, sir, remember?"

Silence.

A horrible, extended silence.

Then---

"_Get the damn dogs!!"_

"Y-yes sir!" the officer cried, veritably turning and running away, thanking heaven as he went that he still was in possession of all of his teeth. Beadle Connor leapt down from the carriage, slamming the door shut behind him with unnecessary force, barking strings of orders as the police convoy was thrown into chaotic activity all around him.

"Bring the dogs! Calm those horses down! _Bring me Bonnegen's handcuffs! _With _gloves, _for God's sake! I said _move!"_

The cuffs were found, the dogs swiftly rounded up, and the officers handling them brought to silent, straight-backed attention.

"I have three simple words of instruction for you," the Beadle projected loudly, flourishing his cape over his shoulder and narrowing his thick, menacing brow. "Words of instruction that even incompetent fools like yourselves can understand." The Beadle inhaled deeply, and shouted so loudly that the dog nearest to him whined and pressed its ears against its skull;

"_FIND JACK BONNEGEN!"_

_You make mistakes. Grave, irreparable mistakes._

Beadle Connor sneered against the voice, turned on his heel, and stormed back to his carriage as all around him, hounds bayed, horses whinnied, men shouted, and the pounding hooves and footsteps of the investigation were thrown back on track, and his trophy---his rabbit, his stag, his acceptance to Oxford law---_Sweeney Todd_---was once more trained within his sights.

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

It was funny---it had been less than a week since they left the pie shop in London, but already Nellie had forgotten just how wonderful it was to have a good, long rest in a safe, warm place with a roof over her head. The strange farmhouse cottage made her feel safer than she had been in days…and with a clean dress and her hair at long last raked through with her fingers and piled back on her head in her old flyaway up do, she felt fresher and cleaner than she had in ages. The cottage became home in less than the time it took for she and Toby to fall fast asleep on the double feather bed in the second bedroom. They slept for hours in the pure, exhausted security of the walls and the blankets, and when they awoke it was nearly twilight. Nellie then went on an exploration of the kitchen and nearly cried when she came upon the sight of _food_…real, honest-to-God _food, _not just apples and stale cheese and moldy bread. In a wild, thoughtless frenzy, Nellie just cooked---cooked as she had never cooked before, banging pots and pans onto the stove with twice the force and volume as was necessary and pulling the meat before it was fully cooked. For a blissful twenty minutes she and Toby ravenously gave themselves over to their first real tuck-in in days. As soon as the immediate pangs of her hunger had been satisfied, however, her attention immediately returned to Mr. Todd, who had not so much as flinched from his unconscious position on the sofa. She wiped her mouth with the back of her hand and rose from the table, her eyes and lips pursing into a thoughtful, worried frown as she approached him.

_When was the last time he ate?_

She then remembered their pathetic breakfast earlier that morning, which had consisted of a single hunk of dry bread for each of them…but judging by how little energy it had given her, she couldn't imagine how weak it had left Sweeney feeling.

"D'you reckon we should try an' wake 'im, mum?" Toby asked, sliding down from his chair.

"I don' know, love," Nellie muttered, lowering to her knees and laying her hand over Mr. Todd's forehead. "'E 'as to eat…'e can't sleep like this forever."

A sharp hiss from the fireplace drew her attention, and she saw that the embers were swiftly dying down. With each passing moment, the rich, colored light from the sunset streaming through the curtained windows grew dimmer and dimmer.

""Ere, Toby…run an' fetch some more firewood, and then try an' find as many candles as you can. We're goin' to 'ave to spend the night."

Toby nodded and hurriedly went to rummage more kindling out of the woodbox in the corner. His small footsteps pattered all around the cottage as he worked, but Nellie's gaze couldn't be drawn away from Mr. Todd's softly closed eyelids. Not for the first time, she found herself staring almost in fascination at his blank features.

_Amazing…how gentle he looks like this…_

_What should she do? Should she try and wake him? Would he wake up on his own?_

Nellie wet her lips nervously. She was terrified of doing him any further damage than had already been done, but…it wasn't as if he could go for hours and hours without eating something…particularly after he'd lost so much blood….

_His throat opened and blood….his red blood….poured out…._

The image sprang unbidden to Nellie's mind, and she quickly squeezed her eyes shut. Without knowing it, her hand went to Mr. Todd's arm and grasped it firmly. The fabric of his sleeve was stiff and scratchy. She opened her eyes, and saw that it was because the cloth was saturated with brown, dried blood. In fact, practically his entire torso was stiff and crusted with it. She instantly made up her mind on what to do.

"Toby," she called, and he looked up from the candle he was lighting with matches he'd found somewhere.

"Yeah?"

"When you found this dress for me, did you see any other clothes? Men's clothes, per'aps?"

"Ahhh…I dunno, mum."

"Be a dear an' go look? Oh…an' would you see if you can find me a washbasin and some clean rags as well?"

As Toby slipped into the bedroom, Nellie went into the kitchen and took down a black kettle from its hook on the wall, filled it with water from the rustic old pump near the wall, and put it over the gas. She stood with her shoulders hunched, her arms taught and her hands propping her up on the counter. She sighed and closed her eyes. She listened to the therapeutic sound of water in the kettle as it slowly began to hiss and bubble. Even with five or six hours of Elysian sleep under her belt, she was still weary as hell….

"Found somethin!'" Toby's exuberant voice broke her thoughts. She looked up and smiled.

"There's my smart thing!" She took the clothes draped over his outstretched arm and held them up, inspecting them.

"They didn't 'ave much in the way o' men's things," Toby explained, shifting the weight of the washbasin to both hands. "But I found some shirts, at least."

"Splendid, darlin', just what I wanted," she replied. "Now fill that basin with 'ot water an' bring it to the 'arth, would you love?"

It wasn't until she was kneeling beside Mr. Todd, the bowl of steaming water on one side of her, the clean shirts on the other, and her hands hovering over the neck of his clothes that Nellie hesitated. A strange, unfamiliar sensation gripped her a few inches somewhere above her naval, and it seemed to weight her down like an anchor and cause her face to flush.

"You want me to do it, mum?" Toby asked quietly from the chair behind her.

She blinked and shook herself. What was wrong with her? Nellie had been called a great deal of things in her life---a _great deal _of things---but _shy _had certainly never been one of them. She'd managed to make it through her entire life operating without the smallest ounce of embarrassment about _anything…._embarrassment was a delicacy, a luxury that dirt poor, tragically widowed women like herself simply could not afford in London, not when there were bills to pay and a mouth to be kept fed. And even before that, she had undressed and stuffed into his nightshirt her drunken, snoring Albert Lord only knew how many times. So why _now_ was she suddenly as red and fidgety as a school girl?

The answer, of course, came to her immediately.

_You never felt about Albert---or any of the others---the way you do about him._

She closed her eyes and swallowed.

"No, o' course not Toby," she answered. "You done more than enough. You jus' sit tight an' relax."

The first button was the hardest. Not only because her hands were uncharacteristically clumsy and trembling obnoxiously, but because the dried blood had practically fused the button into its hole. It was only with a great deal of careful prying that she managed to loosen it. After the first five buttons, she reached his vest---and stopped. How in the world would she get it off him without jostling him all about? She ran her fingers thoughtfully over the blood-encrusted material, and in a single, decisive moment, determined to do something she had never once in all her poverty-ridden years considered doing. She was going to have to have to deliberately ruin a piece of clothing. She took up the sewing scissors she had used to snip Mr. Todd's stitches and swiftly, firmly, she cut the vest open from his belt to his chest. She then cut each side to the arm hole, so that the stiff fabric fell away completely, revealing his red-brown shirt that had once been white. She heard Toby let out a low, grave whistle behind her.

"Coo, _blimey _but there's a lot o' blood," he whispered anxiously.

"It's alrigh', darlin', it's not all 'is." Only after she spoke did Nellie realize how little comfort that statement offered. She tightened her lips into a straight line and went on with her work, carefully wrenching open the blood-sealed buttons.

The last button was opened all too quickly. Nellie stared, her heart palpitating, at the open rift running down his shirt and the scant glimpse of his skin between it. There was nothing left but to do it. She placed her twitchy fingers one each edge of the fabric, closed her eyes, and pulled it open.

Now Nellie had seen the naked chest of a man before. _Many _times. She was sure she would know what to expect when she gently cracked open her eyes. What she didn't expect was for the breath to leave her lungs and her heart to pound wildly as she looked down at him.

It didn't make sense. There was nothing spectacular, in the general sense, about Sweeney's torso---she was sensible enough to tell herself that. His skin was smooth and pale…as ghostly pale as one would expect it to be….his muscles were long and lean, the gentle ripples of his thin stomach only partially defined, the bumps of several ribs visible on either side, his hard breast rising and falling only the tiniest, imperceptible fraction as he breathed shallowly in and out. She had seen other chests before. Why was it so impossible for her to look away…or even _blink…_as she stared down at his?

_Silly question, _she immediately thought, almost laughing at herself. _Because you love him._

_Sweeney Todd…._

_You're the most beautiful thing I've ever seen._

Regaining the feeling in her hands, Nellie took the scissors and cut again, this time from the front opening of the shirt all the way down Mr. Todd's arms to the cuff of the sleeve, and again the pieces of fabric fell away, revealing his bare, thinly muscular arms. For just a moment, Nellie let her fingers trace gently over his body, savoring in his surprising warmth, given the briskly chill air of the cottage.

Nellie took up one of the clean rags and soaked it in the hot water, wringing it out before cautiously laying it over Mr. Todd's chest and gently scrubbing back and forth over the skin. The translucently red smears of blood yellowed, then began to trickle away the more water she washed over him. After the fourth pass of the cloth over his stomach, she had to stifle a sharp yelp as Sweeney abruptly moved. She yanked the rag away, sitting bolt upright and staring, breath baited, at his face. He winced in his sleep, narrowing his brow and wrinkling his forehead, shifting his torso slightly. He issued a faint groaning noise, then fell silent again.

"Maybe 'e's waking up," Toby leaned forward eagerly. But after several minutes, the heavy silence persevered.

Nellie exhaled. "No, Toby, I don' think so." Then an irresistible smile tugged at the corners of her mouth as she carefully continued to wash him. "Though….if I didn' know any better, love, I'd say our Mr. T was ticklish."

Toby giggled appreciatively.

After a long, slow process, every available inch of Sweeney's skin was finally clean of blood, and the ruined remnants of his shirts had been eased out from under him. Next came the much more daunting task of redressing him in the fresh vest and shirtsleeves Toby had found.

"I think we'll 'ave to sit 'im up, Toby. There ain't any other way."

Carefully, as if he were made of glass and might crack beneath her fingers, Nellie slowly lifted Mr. Todd's torso off the sofa, shocked at how heavy he felt. Amazingly, his eyelids barely even flickered as she pressed her palms on his chest and back, holding him until his shoulders hunched and his head hung forward, balancing himself. As swiftly as possible she slipped the white shirt over his arms and buttoned it, followed by the collar, vest, and tie. She figured the more pieces he had, the warmer he would be…otherwise she wouldn't have troubled herself with the bothersome scarf. When she was finally done, he looked comfortingly more life his old self…she laid him back down on the couch, astounded that he had remained fast asleep throughout everything.

Even more tired than she had been before, but feeling strangely warm and content inside, Nellie let out a loud half-yawn and rose to her feet.

"All this reminds me…Toby, I'm so sorry, love, but would you be an absolute _sweet'eart _an' go get our last bag from the barn? It ain't got much in it, now, but we should still keep an eye on it."

"Course I will, mum," the boy sprang up, eager to be of any further help. "Back in a tick."

The door closed behind him, and Nellie bent over to pick up the washbasin and scraps of ruined clothes. No sooner had she set both down on the kitchen table than the front door burst open again and Toby ran inside, slamming it shut and throwing his back to it, his eyes wide and frightened. Nellie jumped, clapping a hand to her chest.

"_Jesus, _Toby, you'll ruin this ole 'eart yet! What's wrong??"

Toby was gasping for breath as if he'd been running. His eyes were enormous with fear as he looked at her and uttered one word.

"_Dogs."_

Nellie's heart skipped a beat.

"What did you say?"

"Dogs. I 'eard 'em, mum, howlin' out in the fields. I _'eard 'em."_

Nellie practically sprinted to the door and pulled Toby aside, yanking it open and sticking her head out into the cold winter twilight. She closed her eyes and listened.

A sound, a low, sustaining howl, mournful and terrifying, floating lightly to her ears on the delicate wind. Then another, and another. A pack of hounds, baying continually somewhere far off…but not _very far off._

_They would be there in minutes._

Nellie slammed the door. A very large part of her wanted to scream. Wanted to scream and throw something and give up. She was sick of running. So fucking sick of running.

She looked at Mr. Todd. She looked at Toby, his eyes searching her, pleading for instructions. She closed her eyes. She screamed on the inside.

_We can't give up._

_No matter what happens, we've come too far now. We can never give up. We'll run for the rest of our lives._

"Come on Toby," she seized him by the wrist without another word and dragged him over to the sofa. "Same as before. You get at 'is feet."

Like a smoothly operating machine, the three of them made their way toward the door. Nellie pushed it open with her back and in no time they were hurrying as swiftly as they could across the snow toward the barn.

"They'll find us there!" Toby protested.

"Hush," Nellie snapped, her eyes cold and clear as they stared forward. Something in her seemed to have changed. It was as the final stages of a slow process that had been going on over the last few days of her life had at last culminated in a single instant, and she had been changed. Her already rock-hard sense of practicality had been chiseled and sharpened into a diamond point, piercing forward, never looking back. She had been a hard woman before. She was something entirely unstoppable now. She was wrought out of iron.

_We'll run for the rest of our lives if we have to._

"Into the barn, Toby," she directed, and wrestled the sliding door open and went inside. It was almost pitch dark save for the lantern that still hung burning from the loft. The old dappled horse whinnied shrilly in fear and alarm, tossing its head and pawing the ground and kicking the rickety wooden sides of its stall.

"This way," Nellie said, leading them towards the stall.

"But the horse'll…"

"Quiet, Toby! It's the 'orse we're goin' to _use. _Come 'ere and 'old up 'is shoulders._"_

Toby gently lowered Mr. Todd's feet to the floor and quickly changed places with Nellie, struggling to brace his head and shoulders somewhat upright. Nellie immediately darted to the stall, slowed down, and cautiously opened the creaking gate.

"Shhhhhh," she whispered gently, slowly easing herself around the nervous horse. It pawed the ground, trying to back away from her and bumping the side of the stall.

"_Shhhhhhh. _Easy, there….that's right….shhhh…."

She moved forward in one smooth motion and took hold of the horse's head, gently stroking its nose with her palm. It tossed and snorted for a few seconds more, then gradually began to calm down.

Toby's eyes darted back to the door. "Quick mum!" he cried. "The dogs! I can _hear 'em!"_

Nellie reached over and lifted the closest bridle she saw from its peg on the wall. With swift, direct fingers she slid it over the animal's head and fastened it in its jaw and over its ears, thanking heaven as she did that her uncle had been a cabby and had let her play with his mare whenever he came to visit.

"_Quick!"_

"Come along, love…_there_ you are, there's my pretty boy," Nellie cooed comfortingly to the horse, leading it out of its stall.

"This is gonna be 'ard," she muttered, once the horse was finally standing still and quiet. "Toby…you see a footstool, or somethin', anywhere?"

"There!" he pointed to a bucket sitting against the wall.

Nellie grimaced, but at that very moment she was certain she could hear the faint baying of the hounds as they drew ever closer.

"It'll 'ave to do. 'Ere…'oist him up, best you can…jus' like that…" she hurried and seized the bucket, setting it upside down beside the horse and standing on it. "Right now…let me take 'im by the shoulders, right like that, and you get be'ind 'im, and when I say _now, _you got to be ready to lift up 'ard as you can, _got it?"_

The boy nodded fiercely. "Got it mum."

"Right then. Ok, love…two…three…_now!"_

Nellie uttered a sharp cry of effort as she wrapped her arms around Mr. Todd's torso and heaved with every bit of strength left to her in her weary body. Toby pushed up beneath his legs as hard as he could, and Nellie felt the bucket beneath her giving way as she gave the final push and hoisted Mr. Todd up onto the horse. Her foothold slipped out from under her and she toppled to the ground, landing flat on her back on the hard-packed dirt. She cried out in pain, and the horse immediately whipped into a frenzy. It shrieked and snorted, pawing its front hooves in the air. Nellie yelped and rolled away to avoid being crushed, and Toby was at her side in a moment.

"NO!" she screamed. "Watch the---!"

But before either of them could do anything, the horse had turned and bolted, Mr. Todd straddling it's back and leaning limply forward over its long neck. The side exit of the barn was a swinging rather than a sliding door…the horse must have known this, because it headed straight for it, kicked it off its feeble latch with its front hooves, and ran outside, Sweeney barely remaining seated on its saddle-less back.

"_NO!" _Nellie wailed, scrambling to her feet, ignoring the shooting pain in her back. "We've got to catch it, Toby! You've got to go an' get on!"

"But what about you??" Toby cried.

"Never _mind, go, _run now before it---"

But something stopped Nellie dead in her tracks. She froze, spun around, and immediately seized Toby in her arms and clamped a hand over his mouth. Her breath hovered before in a white cloud, her entire body stock-still and trembling.

There were voices outside. More than a dozen voices. Mingled among the snorting of jittery horses and the continuous barking of restless dogs.

Nellie's heart pounded. She tightened her arms around Toby's small, hot little body…she hugged him closer to her, for just an instant….then she took him and threw him out the door of the barn.

"_Go, Toby!" _she ordered, fighting back tears as the boy fell into the snow, looking back at her with incredulous eyes. "Follow the 'orse! Stay with Mr. Todd and take the 'orse….the two o' you ride, ride far away, _far__ far away from 'ere!"_

"No!" Toby shouted viciously, tearing to his feet. "I _won't leave you alone!"_

"You're my son, Toby."

He stopped.

"Go with your dad an' find someplace safe, love."

Nellie seized his face in her hands, smashed a kiss against his forehead, and pushed him backwards out the door again, this time slamming it shut and throwing the latch. He pounded on it once, but she had already run across to the other side of the barn and through the doorway. Everything moved in a surreal, silent blur. For a moment, every noise disappeared…every dog, every horse, every voice…everything fell completely silent. The only sound was the pounding of her footsteps, whisking through the dry snow as she ran from the barn. They came immediately into her sights…the coaches, lit with glowing lanterns, the teams, harnessed and restless, the men with dogs, and the policemen. All of them were standing in front of the farmhouse, circled around Jack Bonnegen's corpse. They hadn't noticed her yet.

For a single instant as she tore onward, Nellie closed her eyes. She saw Toby framed for an instant in the doorway, his expression wrought with panic and refusal. She saw Sweeney, unconscious on the sofa, as she cleaned the dry blood from his bare skin.

_Her love._

_Run. Run far away. Run forever if you have to._

_I'll slow them down._

"HERE I AM!"

The silence shattered. Every noise burst back into existence. A dozen or more faces jerked up toward to sound of her echoing scream. Someone pushed three people aside to force his way to the outside of the circle and stare. She recognized him….the thin sneer, the hate-filled, raging burn of his eyes, the dark cape, the menacing cane. Beadle Connor stood there, a look of complete and utter shock writ across his loathing features.

She didn't care.

Nellie stopped running when she came within the ring of light cast by the mounted lanterns. For what seemed an impossibly long moment, every eye simply stared at her. She was breathing hard, and tears welled in the corners of her eyes, but never fell. She pierced her mouth firmly shut and let her arms fall calmly to her sides.

"'Ere I am," she said blankly.

"SIEZE HER!"

Four men fell upon her instantly. She didn't even bother to resist as they wrenched her arms behind her and shackled her wrists. She bit her lip and winced against the pain in her back as they shoved her forward…but she refused the cry out. She didn't utter a single noise.

"_LET 'ER GO!"_

Nellie jerked her head up. Her eyes widened.

"NO TOBY!" she screamed. "_No!!"_

But it was too late. Toby threw himself at the officer gripping her handcuffs, and within seconds he had been grabbed and wrestled easily into submission, pinned down by two other men.

The tears fell. Nellie screamed and fought against the shackles, thrashing hysterically to no avail.

"No! No no no no! Not Toby! Not my little boy!"

"_Shut up!"_

Nellie was cut off in mid-shriek as a balled fist dug deep into her stomach. The air was sucked from her lungs and she doubled over, Toby's furious screaming muffled in her ears.

"Restrain them!" Beadle Connor was ordering. Everything seemed to be moving in slow motion, and yet before she knew what was happening, she and Toby were beside each other on their knees in the snow, their hands bound behind them and their shoulders hanging heavily forward. They were surrounded by a half-circle of policemen, the hound dogs restrained on their leashes. Nellie peered forward blearily through half-seeing eyes. Her hair had been jostled loose in the struggle, and it fell down unkemptly once more around her shoulders. She looked at Toby and suppressed a soft cry. His nose was bleeding and he already had bruises on his face.

"Don't 'urt him," she said, her voice weak and ragged. She looked up and spoke louder. "Don't 'urt. Do whatever you bloody want with me, jus' don't 'urt my---"

_SMACK._

Her head jerked to side, stars flashing in front of her eyes. The Beadle withdrew his hand and pulled his leather glove tighter over his fingers.

"Where is he?"

Nellie looked up. She tasted blood. She stared, squinting, into the Beadle's shadowed face as he stood over her.

"Who?" she muttered blankly.

_SMACK._

She winced, squeezing her eyes shut.

"_Stop it!" _Toby was shouting. "I'll kill you, you stinking---"

"Take the child away," Beadle Connor said calmly. One of the constables dragged Toby to his feet and stuffed him inside the nearest carriage.

"NO!" Nellie cried, more tears forming in her eyes. "Leave 'im alone! 'E ain't done nothin', 'e's just a _boy!"_

_SMACK._

Her face was beginning to get very warm. The Beadle was alternating cheeks as he slapped her repeatedly.

"I asked you a question. _Where is he?"_

Nellie looked down, the tears running down her cheeks. They were tears of anger. A slow fire was building up inside of her.

"I don' know."

_SMACK._

"You are protecting a murderer. He has killed _five people."_

In spite of herself, in spite of the pain radiating through her body, in spite of everything…..Nellie couldn't help smiling.

_Really, _she thought, snickering silently to herself. _Sweeney Todd….he only killed five, did he?_

"You find this _funny??"_

_SMACK!_

The gloved hand slapped against her face harder than before. Her neck cracked as her head jerked aside---she gasped and coughed, but still refused to emit any sound of pain.

"_FIVE people! _Do you _understand that? _A judge, a beadle, my own _brother…._" Beadle Connor snarled viciously on the word, his mustache bristling, "…and _now _this girl and Jack Bonnegen!"

Nellie looked defiantly upward. "_I _killed Jack Bonnegen," she muttered.

_SMACK!_

Nellie coughed again, rolling her jaw. Her eyes watered thickly and her mouth was slowly filling with blood.

"I'll ask you one more time," the Beadle threatened, lowering to one knee in front of her so that his face was level with hers. His voice low and even, but the edges of hysterical, barely controlled rage were plainly beginning to creep in. "_Where is he?"_

Nellie looked up, staring straight into his eyes. Her lips parted and her eyes narrowed. The Beadle glared expectantly, his gaze leering straight into her as if to penetrate into her brain.

"_Where?" _he hissed.

She hocked loudly in the back of throat, and spat blood into his face.

The Beadle roared furiously, rearing back, sputtering and wiping his eyes.

"_Constable!" _he railed. One of the men stepped forward. "Search the house and the barn! Take the dogs and search every last miserable scrap of this God-forsaken farm!"

The men and the dogs set off immediately, and the Beadle turned to one of the men by the line of coaches.

"You! _Bring me the Hopes!"_

Nellie's seething glare immediately dropped and her eyes opened wide.

_The __**Hopes?**_

_It couldn't be…._

She watched in silent disbelief as the officer saluted obediently, then proceeded to march to the second carriage in the line, yank open the door, bark orders inside of it, and drag a huddled and terrified-looking young couple out into the snow. Nellie's jaw descended.

_Anthony and Johanna. It __**was **__them. How in the world…??_

"Hope!" the Beadle shouted, and Anthony was pushed forward, stumbling. He looked back at Johanna, who was being held around the shoulders by a policeman, her young, enormous blue eyes shining with fear. Beadle Connor seized Anthony by the collar and dragged him forward.

"_Is this the woman??"_

Anthony looked down, and his face blanched in combined expression of utter shock and relief.

"Mrs. Lovett!!" he cried. Before Nellie could speak he had fallen to his knees in front of her and hugged around her shoulders, holding her head in his hand. He leaned back, cupping her face with one hand. "Mrs. Lovett, you're blee---"

"That's enough!" the Beadle barked, pulling Anthony back.

"_No!" _he protested, struggling against the Beadle's grip. "What have you done to her?? Mrs. Lovett, mum, where's Mr. Todd? _Is he alright?"_

"Anthony, _be quiet," _Nellie hissed desperately.

"Constable!"

"Yes, sir?"

"We have witness confirmation. Take her into custody."

Nellie gasped as she was yanked to her feet from behind, the ground spinning dizzily beneath her. Her head was beginning to feel fuzzy, her cheeks perpetually flushed from being stricken so many times.

"What are you doing? Let her go!!" Anthony cried. "She's not done anything wrong!"

"_Silence, _boy!" the Beadle abruptly turned and cuffed Anthony across the face, sprawling him to the ground. Behind them Johanna cried out.

"_Leave him alone!" _her cries were stifled into a yelp as the policeman covered her mouth with his hand, and she began to cry softly.

"You and your _wife _are of but one further purpose to me," the Beadle sneered at Anthony's stunned, incredulous face. "You will return with me to London, to the new House of Records in Bell Court, and give as much information as you are able on these _criminals."_

Three sets of ears perked up at once; Nellie's, Anthony's, and Johanna's. Johanna instantly stopped struggling against the officer and became deathly still, her face whitening visibly.

"Did you say…_Bell Court?" _Nellie whispered hoarsely.

The Beadle glared sharply at her. "Of what import is it to _you? _Bell Court, yes. The house of the late Judge Turpin has been renovated and converted to a new located for the House of legal records. If the Hopes will _cooperate, _they needn't be there longer than---"

"NOOO!"

The shriek was so ear-piercing, so utterly wrought with unspeakable, bone-chilling horror, that every eye immediately turned to its owner. Johanna was thrashing with all her might against the constable, yanking and clawing in a terrified frenzy, screaming at the top of her lungs.

"NO! I WON'T GO BACK THERE! I WON'T GO BACK! _YOU CAN'T MAKE ME GO BACK!"_

"Johanna!" Anthony leapt to his feet and ran to her, pulling her away from the constable and into his arms. Even after her face was pressed into his chest, Johanna's muffled screams continued to issue forth in a terrible, haunting cry of terror.

"_NO! I won't! I won't go back! Never!!"_

_Damn! _Nellie's gaze shot from Johanna to the Beadle, and sure enough, he was staring at the couple in a new fascination, the gears visibly churning behind his cruel eyes.

"What was that you said?" he asked quietly.

"Johanna, _hush!" _Anthony pleaded, but she only wrapped her arms around him tighter, whipping her head back and forth beneath his chin.

"_NO! I won't go back to Judge Turpin's house, I WON'T! YOU CAN'T MAKE ME!"_

"_Back, _to Judge Turpin's house, you said?" the Beadle muttered, a thin, oily smile slowly spreading across his features. "Tell me, son…what was it you said your wife's name was, again?"

Anthony only stared at the Beadle, cornered, trembling, clutching Johanna to him for dear life.

"Johanna, you said it was, wasn't it?" the Beadle nodded, smiling. "Might I ask you what her maiden name was? It wouldn't have been _Turpin, _by any chance, would it?"

Johanna looked up, her blue eyes wide and frightened as she slowly realized what she'd done. The Beadle let out a piercing, jubilant cackle.

"Of _course! _Why didn't I recognize her before?? _Johanna, _with the pretty little face and long yellow hair? She's Judge Turpin's little ward, all grown up!"

"Stay away!" Anthony shouted, the Beadle and the officers beginning to circle round them like a pack of wolves. "Just stay away from us!"

"I owe you an apology, Mr. Hope. I was mistaken," the Beadle laughed triumphantly, reaching forward and seizing Johanna by the wrist, wrenching her away. She screamed shrilly.

"_GET YOUR HANDS OFF HER!" _Anthony roared furiously, but he was already being subdued by three policemen.

"Yes, I was mistaken when I said the two of you need return to London with me. I believe I'll only be requiring the return of Miss Turpin, after all."

"_NO! __**NO! **__LET HER GO!"_

"I would like to thank you for your services in the assistance of this investigation, Mr. Hope. You've been _most _helpful."

Anthony continued to scream and curse, struggling violently against the arms of the constables, but it was no use. Nellie watched helplessly in transfixion of horror and disbelief as Johanna was thrown, shrieking and sobbing, into the back of the same coach as Toby. As soon as she was locked inside, one of the policemen behind Anthony took a pistol from his belt and raised it high over his head. Nellie gasped.

"Look out!" she cried, her voice cracking and blood flecking her lips.

It was too late. The constable brought down the butt of the revolver----_CRACK----_on the back of Anthony's skull, and the young man immediately went limp, his eyes rolling in his head as he fell face forward into the snow.

The Beadle stood over him, chuckling to himself.

"Most helpful indeed, Mr. Hope."

He turned on his heel to face Nellie and the two officers holding her arms.

"Where to with this one, sir?" the one on her left asked.

"Throw her into the wagon," the Beadle muttered, shooting a hate-filled glare into Nellie's face. She returned it, her eyes burning silently. "The empty one. I want some time _alone with her."_

The words sent a sick, nauseating turn through Nellie's insides, and she shuddered. Her seething scowl melted into an expression of wide-eyed fear and disgust; she stared into the Beadle's shadowed, mustached face, and a twinge of repulsion coursed through her body.

The constable nodded. "Right, sir. And where to now?"

"Didn't you hear, officer? We're to return to London immediately."

The two officers straightened slightly, their eyebrows lifting in surprise.

"But…but sir," the second one said questioningly. "I thought…I mean…what about Mr. Todd, sir?"

The Beadle looked past them, and Nellie craned her neck to follow his gaze. The team of officers with dogs was returning from the house and the barn, and the Beadle's lips curled into a knowing smile as they drew near.

"He isn't here."

"No, sir," the first of the officers wincingly replied.

The Beadle only nodded, his demeanor completely cool and collected.

"As I suspected. No, men, I believe this branch of our search has come to an end. There is no further progress to be made by searching the countryside. We are to return to London immediately, deal with the prisoners, and regroup our forces."

The Beadle turned suddenly to Nellie, and when his gaze locked onto hers she felt the startling, nearly irrepressible urge to vomit.

"Besides," the Beadle muttered, closely, so that only she could hear; "I have the most distinct feeling that in a very short time, Mr. Todd will be coming to _us."_

"_No," _a faint voice whispered nearby. They looked to see Anthony, the back of his head trickling blood into the snow, lifting his face and his hand to reach feebly up toward the Beadle. He hovered for a moment, and then collapsed again, his eyes half-lidded and his breathing shallow. The Beadle grinned once in Nellie's direction, then turned and walked away, stepping over Anthony's body as he went.

"The child is to be delivered to the St. Peter's Orphanage in Charring, upper London. As for Mrs. Lovett and the young Miss Turpin, they are to be taken to the House of Records in Bell court, where I shall deal with them personally until the time when they may be admitted to other establishments. We shall reconvene the investigation at a later date."

The Beadle strolled to the door of the last empty carriage, standing beside it and straightening his hat and collar. Nellie swallowed thickly as she was led in his footsteps by the two policemen. She looked down sadly at Anthony as she passed him by. Then---an idea. It struck her like lightning, and she acted immediately, without think. She shot a quick glance to the officer on her left…then pretended to trip over her own feet and fell flat on her face in the snow, lying beside Anthony's body.

"What the…on your feet!" the officer barked.

"_Anthony!" _Nellie hissed sharply. He slowly turned his head to look at her, blinking.

"Johanna," he croaked. "Where've they taken Johanna?"

"_Listen, Anthony!" _she insisted.

"Come on! I said _on your feet, bitch!" _the policemen struggled to drag Nellie off the ground, but she repeated wrestled herself free, rolling from side to side and eluding their efforts as slippery as a fish.

"_Anthony…follow the 'oof prints east from the barn!" _she whispered. His eyes narrowed in confusion. _"Quickly, before the snow ruins 'em…..follow the tracks and you'll find Mr. Todd!"_

Anthony's eyes shot open, but that was the last thing Nellie saw before the officers finally hoisted her to her feet.

"Now _walk!"_

They shoved her forward, and she came to the carriage where the Beadle was waiting expectantly. He smiled politely at her, mockingly bowed his head, and held the door open for her and she was lifted inside. She tried to cast a final glance back to Anthony, but the Beadle stepped into the doorway, blocking her view of him.

"Ladies first," he smiled greasily through his teeth. Nellie ignored him completely, stifling the quiver of disgust as he climbed into the coach after her and sat on the opposite seat. The door was slammed shut, and within a minute the crack of reigns and the whinny of horses sounded outside; the coach lurched forward, and the procession was on its way back to London.

"Make yourself comfortable, Mrs. Lovett," the Beadle said calmly, adjusting his shirt cuffs. "We've got quite a lot of work ahead of us, you and I. It's best that you let yourself get well rested _now_, while you still can."

Nellie didn't give him so much a glare. She was staring out the small glass window of the coach, watching as the last traces of sunlight disappeared down over the horizon and the hilly landscape was at last bathed in blue darkness. She watched, heart throbbing, tears burning behind her eyes, but refusing to let them fall. He was out there, somewhere. Alone…

_But he was safe._

_Sweeney. My darling._

The tears fell. She sniffed once as they ran down her flushed cheeks.

_Stay away, _she whispered in her heart. _Stay far away. It doesn't matter what happens. Just stay where you're safe._

_Stay far away…my love._

A/N; Right…so I made a couple of allusions in this chapter to Nellie having had numerous affairs after Albert died. I've seen this mentioned in enough fics by now to consider it as kind of the consensus view that she needed to prostitute herself a few times in order to get by financially after she was widowed. I always liked this idea as a side plot and I wanted to mention it, but only briefly because I don't want that to be the focus of the story. Anyway….like it? Hate it? Squealing uncontrollably with fan-girl joy at the image of Sweeney Todd shirtless? ( and unconscious? Tee hee ) Whatever the answer, as always….reviews make me smile! Oh, and for those of you getting tired of Sweeney's seemingly perpetual unconsciousness, just hold on until the next chapter ( cliff hangers, mwahaha ).


	23. Chapter 23

A/N; Only three days 'til Christmas, y'all! And have I got a gift for _you…_voila, an end to the unconsciousness, as promised! ( in case the title of this chapter wasn't enough of a giveaway ). And on a side note, I just want to take this opportunity to say, _WOW…._People hate Beadle Connor _way more than I expected. _I mean, you guys seriously sound like you _despise him. _Frankly, I'm flattered! ^_^ I'm glad this story has a villain who's detestable enough to garter such venomous rancor! Thanks and happy holidays to all my readers! Reviews make me smile!

Disclaimer; I don't own Sweeney Todd. You don't own Sweeney Todd. ( turns to Steven Sondheim ) Hey, what do you know, _you_ _**do **_own Sweeney Todd!

Chapter 23

_Awakening_

or

_By the Sea, Mr. T.…By the Cold, Cold Sea_

He dreamt of the chair.

The chair, sitting in his barbershop. Straight-backed, innocent…a dusty antique, left over from the bygone days of Albert Lovett's case of the gout. Light, soaked-in covering of dust. A very simple, demure thing, in itself.

He dreamt of the razors.

_His friends, his faithful friends…_there for him, after all those years, waiting…smooth and thin and warm in his hands, the gentle _snick _as they slipped shyly open, the clean slicing through rosy, unsuspecting skin. His friends…his only friends.

He dreamt of the room.

Grey. Light streaming through the overhead window, washing everything in pale white. The table, the shattered mirror, the trap door. The woodstove. The teakettle. The trunk with Pirelli's twitching fingers poking out, with Johanna's terrified face looking up at him. The room.

He dreamt of blood. Simply blood. Red. Everywhere. Dripping from his eyelashes.

_He heard a sound._

It was she who had given him that old chair. He remembered her dragging it up the stairs all by herself, smiling proudly and out of breath when she pushed it into his barbershop. He remembered her plopping down in it, sighing satisfactorily, brushing dust off the armrests with her palms. Chattering away as happily as you please, more to herself than to him. _"Me old Albert's chair, this was…"_

_A continuous, drumming sort of sound. What was that?_

It was she who had saved the razors for him, kept them safe and hidden away in their box beneath the floorboards. He remembered the wondering gaze in her heavy, half-lidded eyes as she looked curiously over his shoulder, lips parted softly, her face reflected in the silver blades.

_He was being jolted lightly up and down in time with the drumming sound._

It was she who'd cleaned up the room for him, swept the floors, washed the windows, polished the mirror on his barbering table, swept the chimney of the woodstove and filled it with kindling, brought the freshly-filled kettle up to him every morning---_every _morning.

"_Never you fear, Mr. Todd….you can move in here, Mr. Todd…."_

_The drumming was so familiar….he was sure he'd heard it a thousand other places before…._

Blood. Red blood. It was she who'd washed it out of his shirts every evening, she who'd been painted to the elbows with it every time he caught a glimpse of her slipping secretly up from the bakehouse after Toby was asleep, a smudged cleaver gripped firmly in her fingers.

It was she whom he dreamt of. He dreamt of Mrs. Lovett.

He dreamt of _Nellie._

_Of course….it was the sound of hoof beats._

It was the fall that woke him. His eyes shot open to discover himself hanging in midair, and a split-second later he was crashing painfully into the ground flat on his back, the snow bursting upwards around him in dry, wafting clouds. He gasped sharply at the sudden shock of cold and of being awake…his senses flooded instantly with information, his pupils dilating in the pale light, his ears filled with the whistling wind all around him, his skin burning with cold. It was too much to take in at once. For a full minute he simply lay there spread-eagle on the ground, paralyzed in shock, his chest heaving for breath, his eyes staring up at the pink sky.

A dull snorting noise drew his attention to the right. He blinked twice. A horse, an old dappled grey, was standing over him. He looked at it with a deadpan stare. It leaned its big head over and nudged him, its velvety muzzle nosing curiously over his face. He moaned softly, squinted, and rolled to the side, slowly rising up to his feet and bracing himself against the horse's back. It whinnied lightly and snorted again before abruptly walking forward, catching him off guard and almost making him lose his balance. He blinked dizzily over and over again, struggling in vain to gather his bearings about him. He felt as if he'd been asleep for days.

That was when he remembered.

His eyes shot open and his hand flew to his neck. His jaw dropped minutely in awe and confusion as his fingers traced lightly over the knobby stitches sealing his throat shut. He winced and drew his hand away, the wound stinging and throbbing under his touch. He looked down and closed his eyes….everything was swaying, and for the life of him he couldn't quell the continual waves of dizziness washing over him. The last thing he remembered was that strange, unfathomable sensation…the feeling of ounce after ounce of his own blood pouring out of him, running down his front, steaming hot one instant and ice-cold the next. Just how much blood had he _lost_, to leave him this weakened? For that matter, how much time had passed? And where the hell _was he_? He involuntarily laid a hand over his chest…and opened his eyes to look down in alarm at his near spotlessly clean vest and shirt.

_What the…how in the hell….what __**happened?**_

There was a dull sound roaring in his ears. The horse trotted lazily a few feet away, and he looked up in the direction it had gone. He blinked, his eyebrows raising. He took a few staggering steps forward, mouth hanging open speechlessly, unable to believe it.

The roaring sound. It was the _sea._

_The honest to God sea._

He was standing at the edge of a vast, sprawling beach, more than a foot deep in snow, stretching for unseen miles in either direction. The dunes rose all around him in rolling hills of white, the feeble remnants of last summer's stick-and-wire fences piping along them in zigzagging lines. For a short run, the water along the shoreline was frozen and covered over with a dusting of snow, but beyond that stretched the enormous, unending eternity that was the ocean. Small breakers were crashing gently against the shore, shooting brisk, sharp cracks through the ice every few moments. It was dawn, and miles away over the line of the horizon, the sun was rising above the water, casting the limitless sky in a gentle glow of pink and pale gold. He stumbled forward on his wobbly legs, staring out at the endless expanse of ink blue ocean….he felt as if he were standing at the very edge of the world.

_How had he gotten here?_

He looked over at the dapple grey, which was now nosing about in the snow, looking for anything to graze on. He narrowed his eyes at it. He obviously must have ridden it here, somehow…but…the last thing he remembered was the darkness closing in around him after his throat had been cut. How could he have…?

He shook his head, struggling to sort out the tangle of questions in his mind. As he did, his thoughts immediately jumped to her.

_Mrs. Lovett._

_Where was Mrs. Lovett?_

Foolishly, as if to glance over and see her standing behind him, he turned a full circle, scanning his surroundings with a desperate, piercing gaze. There wasn't another human being in sight. In fact, the only sign of civilization at all was a row of small seaside cottages, two dozen or more of them spread out for a mile down the beach. They were each dark and devoid of life, all closed and boarded up for the winter; huge snow drifts had almost completely covered their little verandas. A ways behind them were the beginnings of a sparse bank of trees---somewhere nearby, there must have been a small oceanside village.

He turned and looked back at the crashing waves of the sea, shivering with cold as he listened to the churn of the waters. As he stood there alone, hopelessly trying to make sense of things, a faint, miserable smile gently turned on his mouth. It was the same terrible, ironic smile he used to wear months ago when he greeted customers into his barbershop.

_Well….I made it. I made it to the sea, Mrs. Lovett….just like I promised y---_

The thought stopped short and he couldn't finish it. The waves broke against the icy shore. The horse snuffed and pawed the ground somewhere nearby. The wind whistled sharply, whipping his hair in wild movements and making him squint.

_I'm here._

_But not with you._

He was alone.

_Alone. _

With that single word, something broke. Something cracked inside of him, snapped cleanly in two, like a brittle twig. But when it snapped, it snapped _hard. _So hard the pulse reverberated outward and shattered everything else inside of him in a single sonic wave.

He leaned forward and screamed.

He didn't just scream. He _screamed. _He screamed the scream that people hear when they have nightmares about hell.

In that single moment, every hour of silence, every dead, caged in word and thought and feeling, every stifled emotion of the last _sixteen years of his life…._was unleashed. The anger, the hatred, the fury, the vengeance, the tragedy, the horrific, all-consuming loneliness…the longing, the frustration, the sheer, unquenchable bloodlust….the inadmissible, unspoken feelings…the denial...all of it…it poured out of him in a single torrent, a single, unbroken scream of misery and rage and helplessness.

His scream echoed through the empty beaches, echoed across the endless ocean. It echoed in the barren shell of his heart.

When he could sustain the scream no longer, he broke off into a guttural cry of misery and dropped forward onto his knees, gasping for breath, staring out across the sea with empty eyes…emptiness, and something else…._fear._

_What happened? What in God's name happened?_

He lifted a hand once more to his stitched throat.

_Toby. Mrs. Lovett._

_Mrs. Lovett._

_Nellie…._

_Where were they??_

He opened his eyes. He whispered a single word, and it was snatched up by the wind and carried away across the ocean.

"Nellie."

The instant the word left his lips, a voice screamed inside his head.

"_SWEENEY TODD!"_

And then, something happened. Something that he ( or, truthfully, any other living soul in the world ) honestly, in a thousand years, would never have seen coming.

He punched himself in the face.

THWOCK!

The sound of his own fist slamming squarely into the bottom of his jaw jolted through his skull like a shock wave, flashes of electric blue light searing painfully behind his eyes. He punched with enough force to easily crack his mandible, but it was more from shock than anything that he fell backwards, sprawling in the snow, his eyes wide and small choking sounds emitting from his open mouth. His brain was a complete blank. As if in a trance, he lifted his hand in front of him face, his fingers twisted and trembling…his entire arm was trembling, so violently that he seized it with his other hand and gripped it for dear life, struggling to hold it in place. He stared at it incredulously, his mind working furiously to try and comprehend what was happening, and turning up nothing. Even as it shook, his arm seemed to be slowly going numb.

And then it came again…loud, enraged, as sharp and clear as a bell---the voice inside his head.

"_I'll KILL YOU!"_

THWOCK!

In a single lightning fast movement, like the head of a cobra, his arm jabbed forward again and struck, this time in the nose. Sweeney sucked in air and rolled to his side, his eyes watering from the dull, hot pain. But even as the salt tears trickled from the corners of his eyes, his face was twisting in furious recognition.

"Barker," he ground savagely through his teeth.

Then, without the slightest warning, his entire body wrenched to the other side, jerking as if he were beginning to seize. He convulsed once and cried out, not from pain, but from the surreal twisting sensation inside of him as if his very body were being rent internally in two different directions. He thrashed, kicking snow, startling the horse and causing it to turn skittishly away, whinnying shrilly, and canter off a hundred yards or so. He scrambled to his feet, the ground spinning beneath him, breath rushing in and out through his clenched teeth. For some reason, he found himself jerking his head wildly in every direction, as if looking for a visible manifestation of Benjamin to suddenly appear.

"You won't get away with this, _Barker!" _he snarled to the open beach, his voice echoing over the sound of the breakers. "You couldn't kill me then, and you can't kill me now!"

"_Can't I??"_

"AAUU---!"

Sweeney doubled over, mouth open, gasping, the wind sucking from his lungs as his own balled fist dug deep into his gut. He coughed, falling forward onto his hands and knees, choking for air.

He struggled to speak, his words rasping out in a haggard whisper.

"_How---_how are you---??"

"_SHUT UP!"_

Yet again his own fist came flying up at him, nailing him in the face and sprawling him in the snow. He was slowly immunizing himself to the pain, however---this time, he was on his feet almost instantly.

"This isn't your _body anymore!" _he shouted into the air.

Then---silence.

He stood, heart pounding furiously, fists clenched, eyes darting, chest heaving. He waited.

Then---laughing. The sound of Benjamin Barker laughing, a shrill, manic, hysterical laugh, a disturbing laugh, as unlike the gentle barber and husband of sixteen years ago as blood to water. The laughter echoed across the frozen beach, so loudly and frighteningly that the poor dappled horse grew even more skittish, trotting further away toward the row of cottages.

_Wait._

_How…how could Barker's laughter __**echo?**_

Sweeney's hand flew to his throat. _Vibrating._

And then, all at once, it came to him. The laughing, the voice, _Barker…._it wasn't in his head at all. It was _him. _Sweeney was laughing. His own mouth, his own throat, his own lungs---with Barker's voice was piping through them like a puppet. When his arm moved, when his own fist struck him in the face, when his body seized and convulsed…it wasn't him. It was his flesh and bone_, _but it wasn't Sweeney Todd controlling it. Not completely…

For an instant, his mind raced back, back to the instant before the razor had sliced through his throat.

_His own arm…his own hand…his own skin, his own blood…._

_But it hadn't been him….it was Barker._

"Not my body?"

The laughter stifled, and Sweeney found himself clutching his stitched throat with both hands and gasping for air. Even as he did, it was if half of his body was numb…as if half of his being, an unclear, undistinguished half, but half nonetheless, didn't belong to him anymore.

"_This IS my body!!"_

His mouth moved and the words came out…but they didn't belong to him.

His lips turned upward. But it was Barker who was doing the smiling. "So. You've figured it out."

_Benjamin Barker._

It had finally happened.

His memory jolted him back to a day, so, so long ago it seemed now…when he had wondered to himself when this moment would come, the moment when the fine lines between Benjamin Barker and Sweeney Todd would at last become so blurred that they would disappear altogether. That moment was now.

It had finally happened. The lines were gone.

Barker was now as much in control of his body as he was.

"You should have let us die, Todd."

Sweeney stared down at the ground, his fingers tightening over the stitches. He felt as if he couldn't breathe. It wasn't possible. _How could it be possible…._his lips moved, and Barker's words came pouring out, involuntary, like a continuous stream of air.

"You should have _died. _You said it yourself, didn't you? That day at the window, when the snow was falling….you should have _killed yourself after you killed the judge!"_

Sweeney blinked. "How---"

"The walls have fallen down," Barker shot fiercely, and for a brief instant Sweeney stopped to try and wrap his brain around the bizarre fact that this voice had just interrupted itself. "I'm not a ghost you can shut away in your head anymore, Todd. I know everything. _Everything."_

Sweeney stared unseeingly forward. He had straightened up, and his arms now hanging down limp at his sides. Neither he nor Barker made a single move.

"Benjamin," he said suddenly, his voice quiet and calm. The breakers roared, but he didn't hear them. "You know that if I die, you die."

He laughed sporadically, terribly. "You don't think I _realize that? _I _want us to die! _You DISGUST ME, Sweeney Todd! You're nothing but a---a cold-blooded _murderer! _How many innocent men have you killed?? _How many?"_

Sweeney continued to stare forward, barely able to keep his thoughts together in a coherent string.

"I don't know," he said calmly. "How many guilty men have I killed?"

"You mean you don't _care!" _Barker railed viciously, ignoring his question._ "_My…my God…" Barker's voice began to break down, and Sweeney actually felt the beginning of what might have been sobs building up in their now-shared chest. "When I think of….it makes me _sick, _to imagine what…what Lucy….if she _knew…."_

The catch in his chest became tighter. Sweeney felt his eyes on the verge of watering, and he wondered…briefly…which one of them the tears belonged to.

"I want to die, Todd," Barker was muttering. "I've lost everything. My Lucy…my Lucy is gone…and because of _you---" _he snarled the word with as much hatred as he could muster, "---because of _you, _I can never see Johanna again…my Johanna, my poor child…"

The wind rushed sharply past him, cutting to the core of his body. Sweeney opened his eyes.

"Barker."

Silence.

"Barker. I want you to tell me something."

Silence. He didn't try to fathom the idea that he was talking to himself and actually waiting for an answer. His voice was quiet, dark, and as grave as death.

"Why couldn't I kill you a second time?"

No answer. Sweeney narrowed his eyes, waiting, his heart throbbing. _Their _heart throbbing.

For a long, pulsing moment, silence. And then…

"You can't betray her, Todd."

Sweeney exhaled. He stared forward. He blinked.

"What?" he whispered.

"Sweeney Todd. I believe you are evil. I honestly believe you are a demon in human form, sent from the pits of hell to…to _torment_ me. When I stop to think that I…that you…and I….that we were once the same person, I…it makes me want to _destroy myself. _To _burn myself alive. _But even you…the creature that you are….even you can't bring yourself to betray her, any more than I could."

"What are you---" but he stopped in mid-sentence, because he knew. Sweeney felt himself suspended in nothingness for a split second, and then it was as if everything came crashing down around him…his heart became stone and sank like a rock, his eyes slowly closed---the tears, whosever they were, ran down as he did---squeezing shut, as if to block everything out. But try as he might, he couldn't keep it from appearing, as clear as a photograph, glowing like a light in his mind…

_Her face….pale as milk, her full, plum-colored lips…her wide chocolate eyes, sunken, like his own, her delicate nose spotted with tiny, nearly invisible freckles__. Her auburn hair, dark and fiery all at once, and the golden glow of the firelight off her skin. Her hushed, raspy voice, old and tired, yet somehow sweet and small at the same time….as if somehow, somewhere deep inside, no matter how old and weary the world made her, somewhere inside, she would always be little Nellie Lovett, the chatty girl from the other end of Fleet Street, shining shoes on her father's front step._

"_Mr. T."_

_The way she looked at him…._

_The way her hands…her eyes….every part of her….how could he not have realized….he'd been too blinded by hate, by vengeance, by the past, to see…._

_It was not a passionate kiss. It was not even a romantic kiss. It did not last. He did not even put down the carpetbags. It was a spontaneous explosion of impulse, a riot of sensation, a shooting star…._

…_and still….he had kissed her, all the same. Not because of her strange brilliance. Not because of her practicality, her tactical usefulness, her thrift, her charming, twisted, genius. But just because he'd wanted to._

_Because he…._

"Nellie," he whispered.

Barker was shaking his head---_their _head. "No. You can't say it. You can't bring yourself to put your betrayal into words."

The tears kept falling. Sweeney peered through them off at the horizon.

"Betrayal," he said, not quite in the tone of a question.

"_Lucy," _Barker growled, the rage creeping back into his voice. "You love her _every bit _as much as I do. And you and…and Eleanor, the way you've de_filed…_but no, even now, after everything you've done to her, you still can't say it."

That moment, in the barn….

_Tell her you love her._

_I can't._

"I can't," Sweeney whispered.

Barker nodded. "It's the one thing you and I have always shared, Todd. The one true thing that proves we…that we were the same man. _Lucy. We can't betray her."_

Sweeney closed his eyes.

"As long as we have her," Barker said softly, his voice barely audible. "I'll never be gone."

Sweeney touched his stitches. They seared like fire.

"_That's why we have to die."_

His fingers suddenly pressed into the sewed wound…_hard. _Sweeney gasped in blinded, white hot pain as his own fingernails slowly dug against the stitched flesh, tearing, biting.

"Barker…stop…" he growled, his breath half-gone.

"It's the only way," Barker growled back in the same breathlessness. "We have to die, Todd. As long as one of us lives, we _both live. _I won't go on without her. I don't want to live anymore like this. And deep down, Sweeney…._neither do you."_

"_Stop!!" _Sweeney grit out as the faintest wetness of blood threatened to seep out from the stitches. He was struggling with all his might to pry his own hand away from his throat, but Benjamin's strength was exactly equal to his own, and in the cross between them his arm was completely paralyzed. He gasped, choking, his hand tightening around his windpipe, the thread of his stitches pulling taught and digging against his flesh. He suddenly felt as if hands were wrapped around his wrist…were those Barker's, or his? Did he even known anymore?

"_It's the only way, Todd," _Barker was whispering, his voice growing fainter and fainter.

"No…_no…" _Sweeney answered. He had dropped to one knee and was staring down into the blank, nullifying whiteness of the snow. _"No…"_

Somewhere in between the instant he had seen Nellie's face in his mind and the instant Barker had shot his hand to his throat, Sweeney had come to a realization about himself. A realization he would not have voiced aloud to himself, even if he had the breath to do it with.

He realized that Barker was wrong.

He…_he, Sweeney Todd…_actually wanted to live. For the first time in sixteen years, he truly, from the bottom of his soul, wanted to continue living.

But it wasn't that part of the realization that had astounded him.

It was _why he wanted to live._

He wanted to live so that he could look into her wide, childish brown eyes and say the words he couldn't possibly say, the words that would finally destroy Benjamin Barker forever.

_I love you._

"MR. TODD, _STOP!!"_

He barely managed to glance upward, his eyes half-lolling in their sockets. Insanely enough, he could have sworn that that had been Anthony Hope's voice.

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As the line of carriages noisily began to roll away from him, bearing inside them Johanna, Beadle Connor, and now Mrs. Lovett and Toby, Anthony stumblingly forced himself to his feet. His head was fuzzy and throbbing…he held his hand to the back of it, and found that his hair was sticky with drying blood; but the wound itself was small, and congealing fast.

"_Wait," _he coughed out, extending his arm as if to grab the swiftly departing coaches in his fingers. "_Wait…Johanna, don't take her….don't take her from me…"_

He tripped, stumbling forward and almost falling again. The light from the lanterns hanging on the carriages grew fainter and fainter, until at last they vanished completely over the crest of a shallow hill, and all around him was nothing but darkness.

Anthony squinted, struggling to see the ground in front of him, his brain reeling as he struggled to comprehend everything that had just happened. In the back of his mind, at that moment, he could pin down only one thing for certain. He _must _find Mr. Todd.

"_Follow the 'oofprints east from the barn!"_

Mrs. Lovett…the Beadle had taken her….her voice hissed in his brain, urgent, desperate.

"_Follow the tracks and you'll find Mr. Todd!"_

_You'll find Mr. Todd._

_Johanna….her screams, her horrible, terrified screams, echoing over and over in his head…._

_**Johanna.**_

Anthony looked up, his brow narrowed, her name clearing his foggy mind in an instant, like the sweep of a broom. He set his jaw and set off forward toward the dim, swiftly darkening silhouettes of the farmhouse cottage and the barn.

_Johanna. He would not….he would __**not**__….let her be taken from him again. He would get her back. He would get her back or he would bloody well die trying._

_He had to find Mr. Todd._

Less than ten minutes later, wearing a heavy winter coat that he found while rummage through the farmhouse, and carrying a lit lantern that he had found hanging from the hay loft, Anthony was trudging through the snow, his shoulders raised against the biting cold, the light from the lantern illuminating only a few short feet in front of him as he held it at arm's length. He walked the entire perimeter of the barn, and finally, at the small swinging side door, he found them. _Hoof prints. _His heart throbbing, his face set in determination and his chest rising and falling faster with the rush of adrenaline, he lifted the lantern higher, and sure enough, the long, sweeping, unmistakable tracks of a horse in slow gallop continued off across the field, over the short fence and onward toward a bank of trees.

With all the speed and veracity that his undying love for Johanna instilled in him, Anthony took off at a near run, forcing his breath to remain steady and controlled, the lantern swinging madly in his hand. He kept his eyes glued to the trail of hoof prints, never once straying from their path, even as they turned in broad, arching curves. After he'd been running for a solid fifteen minutes, Anthony allowed himself to glance up. Overhead, the sky was completely black, and scattered with thousands of country stars…but far behind him, in the direction opposite of which he was running, the edge of the horizon was still just barely a brighter blue than the sky above, indicating the very last remnants of the already sunken sun. Even through its little curves and side turns, the trail he followed wound consistently due east, as if the horse had been instinctively running towards the day ahead. Anthony narrowed his brow, the breath burning in his lungs…but he didn't slow down, even for an instant. He ran, at a continuous, steady pace, never again looking back. Here an there, the horse's tracks dwindled and mixed in a small clearing or patch of field by the roadside, turning in little circles as if it had been nosing around, looking for grass, but no matter what the prints always started up again, heading continually due east. With any luck, the horse had spent a fair amount of time dallying at these places…that way, the chances were greater that it hadn't traveled as far and Anthony may be able to overtake it before sunrise.

_I'm coming, Mr. Todd. _

His determination pounded harder and surer, shaping like a sheet of steel, with every falling footstep and every ragged breath.

_I'm coming, Johanna…._

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Sweeney struggled to see through watering eyes. He blinked, coughing, drinking in sweet oxygen in enormous gasps. He looked up at the owner of the hands steadily bracing his shoulders, the face staring anxiously into his, the voice repeating the same question over and over…

"Mr. Todd, are you alright? Can you hear me? Mr. Todd, _are you alright??"_

He squinted, fighting to make out the lines of the face.

_How in the hell…._

God in heaven, it _was _Anthony.

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By the time he saw the pale light of dawn approaching him over the eastern horizon, Anthony was scarcely able to drag his feet along through the snow. His eyes were bloodshot and glazed, dark bags long-since appeared beneath them. Despite the sharp chill of the winter air, a thin, perpetually drying and reforming film of sweat lingered across his brow. The lantern had been switched back and forth between his arms a countless number of times, and both of them were so achingly exhausted he didn't feel as if he could lift up the swinging metal chamber a single minute more. Every few seconds he stumbled, his sleep-starved body threatening to pitch forward and collapse…but somehow, he forced himself to go on.

_Johanna. _He trained his thoughts constantly on Johanna, on the gentle turn of her pink mouth as she smiled, the sparkle of her blue eyes when she looked up at him through her lashes…the softness of her waves of yellow hair, cascading over the pillow, caressing against his skin.

He thought of her being dragged into the carriage, her face streaked with tears, the Beadle's leather glove clamped around her wrist like the talon of a vulture.

Every time the horrific scene played through his head, his anger burned vigorously with a renewed fire, and he managed to take another step forward.

The sun was just barely peeking over the horizon when he noticed the terrain growing hillier and hillier, the patches of forest growing farther and few between until the only bit of tree-line that he could see was far away, perhaps a quarter-mile or more off to his left. His muscles screaming, his chest stinging with every freezing inhalation, he scaled the side of a snowy hill, wincing and gritting his teeth with effort. He let out a great burst of air as he at last reached the peak of it, and he blinked in startling shock to realize that he was looking out over the ocean. The faint, pale sunlight glittered over the endless waves of the sea, flashing in his eyes and breaking him from his walking sleep like a slap in the face. He steadied himself, regaining his breath, and surveyed the long stretch of frozen beach before him.

He spotted them instantly.

The horse, the old dappled grey he'd been chasing for more than thirteen straight hours, was idling about by itself not too far away, its tail swishing absently and its hide twitching in the cold air. Every few minutes, it would nervously glance behind it, and trot a few feet farther away from the water. Anthony followed its gaze, and for an instant his heart stopped. There, standing near the edge of the water, a dark, solitary figure, the lone black mark in a plane of seemingly endless white, was---

"_MR. TODD!"_

Anthony yelled for all he was worth, his voice issuing for in a hoarse, ragged cry of jubilation. Never in his life had he been more relieved to see anyone. He immediately dropped the lantern like a stony and set off down the hill, which he now realized to be a snow-covered sand dune, half running, half sliding. He stumbled forward when he reached the bottom, never once breaking his pace, and sprinted toward Mr. Todd as if he had all the energy in the world, shouting out in near-trembling relief.

"Mr. Todd!! Mr. Todd! Oh, sweet God in heaven, you don't know _how _happy I am to have finally fou---"

But as he drew within fifteen feet of his old friend, the smile abruptly faded from Anthony's face, replaced with a look of the utmost astonishment. He slowed to a stop, panting lightly, and gazing at the barber in complete and utter confusion.

"Mr….Mr. Todd?"

Mr. Todd was standing with his profile to Anthony, his back perfectly straight, yet his stature relaxed, his arms at his sides and his chin parallel with the ground. He was staring off into the distance, but his eyes were dark and empty, devoid of sight. It wasn't all of that, however, which caused the sudden chill of unknowing fear to course through Anthony's veins. It was the fact that as Mr. Todd stood there, he was talking almost continuously to himself, his voice springing back and forth as if holding two sides of a conversation. Indeed…he hadn't even noticed Anthony standing there at all.

"You mean you don't _care!" _he was snarling, so sharply and furiously that Anthony jumped when he heard it. Then, the next instant, he had become so quiet and haggard, it sounded as if he might burst into tears any second. _"_My…my God…when I think of….it makes me _sick, _to imagine what…what Lucy….if she _knew……_I want to die, Todd._"_

Anthony's face twisted into a grimace of horror, taking slow footsteps nearer to his friend, yet simultaneously paralyzed as he listened to the stream of convoluted gibberish. For the life of him, he could not fathom was what happening.

"I've lost everything. My Lucy…my Lucy is gone…and because of _you---" _he snarled the word with as much hatred as he could muster, "---because of _you, _I can never see Johanna again…my Johanna, my poor child…"

Anthony blinked. He was certain he had heard that incorrectly.

He stared, his brain scarcely ever registering the words.

_Did…did he just say….?_

_It couldn't be, it was madness….he was jabbering to himself as if he were another person….what on earth was wrong with him? Had Mr. Todd completely lost his mind?_

"Barker," Mr. Todd was now muttered, in a voice different than the one he'd used a split-second ago. "Barker. I want you to tell me something."

Anthony narrowed his eyes. _Barker? Who was Barker?_

"Why couldn't I kill you a second time?"

Anthony slowly shook his head. No. None of this was….this was sheer madness. _Kill you a __**second **__time?_

Mr. Todd was silent for a moment. Then, in a calm voice, he issued forth a string of talk that made Anthony's insides feel hollow with dread and an ever-impending certainty that his dear friend had, in fact, lost his mind.

"You can't betray her, Todd. _What? _Sweeney Todd. I believe you are evil. I honestly believe you are a demon in human form, sent from the pits of hell to…to _torment_ me. When I stop to think that I…that you…and I….that we were once the same person, I…it makes me want to _destroy myself. _To _burn myself alive. _But even you…the creature that you are….even you can't bring yourself to betray her, any more than I could. _What are you---_" he paused for a moment, and his eyes seemed to grow wider. _"Nellie. _No. You can't say it. You can't bring yourself to put your betrayal into words. _Betrayal…Lucy. _You love her _every bit _as much as I do…."

Anthony drew closer and closer, listening in a transfixion of both sadness and fascination. What on earth could have happened to Mr. Todd to leave him such a state? His meaningless rambling continued on and on…Anthony reached out a trembling hand to place on his shoulder, but hovered anxiously in midair, swallowing thickly.

"M-Mr. Todd? It's…it's Anthony. Your friend, Anthony Hope. _Let me help you."_

Anthony circled around him to look his straight in the face….and froze. He stared in silent horror, his eyes widening and the breath choking in his throat.

Mr. Todd's throat had been cut open and sewn shut.

Anthony looked up into the black eyes, staring straight past him, not even remotely seeing him. He opened his mouth a whispered.

"_That's why we have to die."_

Anthony cried out in shock and alarm as Mr. Todd suddenly seized his own wounded throat in his hand and gripped his windpipe. He gasped and sputtered as he began to choke himself. For one horrible instant, Anthony was rooted in place, staring, unable to move. Mr. Todd seized the wrist that was choking him with his other hand, as if one arm was trying to kill him and the other were trying to pry him off. All the while, he was continuing to talk as if in two voices, the words choking out ragged and dying….

"_Barker….stop…._it's the only way. We have to die, Todd. As long as one of us lives, we _both live. _I won't go on without her. I don't want to live anymore like this. And deep down, Sweeney…._neither do you. Stop!!"_

Anthony jerked back to life, seizing Mr. Todd's hands and fighting in vain to try and pry them away from his neck.

"Mr. Todd, STOP!" he cried desperately.

"_It's the only way, Todd. _No…_no….no…."_

They dropped to the ground, Mr. Todd's eyelids lowered, his voice growing fainter and fainter, the life visibly draining from him…

With every vestige of strength he had left, Anthony squeezed his eyes shut and _pulled._

"MR. TODD, _STOP!!"_

For the first time since he'd arrived, Mr. Todd slowly, weakly, turned to look in Anthony's direction. Their eyes met.

Mr. Todd's grip weakened, and his hands fell away.

"_Mr. Todd!" _Anthony cried, his entire body trembling. He seized his friend by the shoulders as he coughed violently, sucking in air in enormous, choking gasps. The stitches on his throat were tinged red with the tiniest traces of blood.

"Mr. Todd, are you alright??" Anthony pleaded over and over again, squaring his shoulders with his and looking him straight in the face. "Can you hear me? Mr. Todd, _are you alright??"_

Still coughing, Sweeney Todd lifted his face and looked into Anthony's eyes. He half-squinted, staring incredulously as if at something he couldn't believe existed.

"Anthony," he whispered.

Anthony nearly began to cry with relief, scarcely forcing himself to contain his trembling.

"Yes! Yes, my friend, I'm _here! I'm here to help you!"_

Mr. Todd looked at him with dark, unflinching eyes. He suddenly reached up and seized Anthony by the collar, pulling him so close that their foreheads nearly touched. Anthony watched with baited breath, his eyes wide and desperate.

"Mr. Todd?"

He whispered four words.

"_Don't leave me alone."_

A/N; Phew! That chapter took a lot out of me…mostly because I did it practically in one sitting. _ lol. Hope it didn't disappoint! And I apologize if it got tedious having to read a big chunk of Sweeney's dialogue twice…I hoped it would be interesting enough hearing it again from Anthony's point of view. Love it? Hate it? Want to desecrate it? Whatever you do, just be sure to _review! _^^ ( haha, sorry, I couldn't help myself )


	24. Chapter 24

A/N; Hey, everyone. Sorry it took me a while to upload this chapter---you know, holidays and all. Enjoy! ^_^ ( and p.s....just to give everyone fair warning, it might be a little while before I get chapter 25 up, too. As the story is nearing the climax, the chapters are getting continually more complicated and harder for me to write, and I really don't want to rush them. I'll do my best to get 25 up at least by the weekend )

Disclaimer; I don't own Sweeney Todd in 2008, and you don't own Sweeney Todd in 2008. And neither of us will own Sweeney Todd in 2009, either. Discuss.

Chapter 24

_A Woman Alone_

or

_A Prisoner, Not Particularly Memorable_

The thing that truly startled Nellie the most was how quickly they seemed to arrive back in London. One moment, she was still staring out through the glass at pitch darkness, and the next she was blinking in the dirty, golden glow of city lampposts. She paused, sitting up straighter in the coach and peering out at the familiar streets, the sooty brick buildings, the painted signs and brick-wall advertisements, the lighted windows. Had it really only been a few days since she left this place? It felt to her as if it had been half a lifetime since she'd been inside the city walls.

Suddenly, her eyes popped open and she was leaning so close to the window that her breath left a foggy white cloud on the glass. Beadle Connor, who had not spoken a word to her since their journey began, smiled and laced his fingers over his crossed legs.

"Home sweet home, eh, Mrs. Lovett?"

His words went in one ear and out the other. Nellie was too busy staring, lips parted, a horrible, sinking kind of nostalgic sadness growing in her heart as she realized what part of London they were in. She tried to lift her hand and press it on the glass as if to reach outside, reach to the past….only to remember that both of her wrists were still shackled behind her back. Her breath caught in her throat and she moved as close to the window as she could, staring woefully outside.

The carriage was rattling down Fleet Street. _Her _Fleet Street, the only place in her entire life that she had ever called home. And then, without any warning, without the slightest ceremony, there it was, right before her dewy eyes. The pie shop. Except it wasn't her pie shop anymore; it was a skeleton, a dead, tired old body of burned bricks and beams, windowless, lifeless, soulless. It sat alone on the corner, a great, blackened, blasted out shell of its former self----a silent corpse, waiting for the inevitable end. For one brief moment, it was framed perfectly in the window of the carriage, and Nellie stifled a gasp of pain as her whole being reached out for it, yearned to walk through its windowed door and hear the jingling of the bells, just one last time…but before her eyes even had the chance to mist over, it was gone. The carriage ambled calmly past it and it was left behind them…nothing but a memory.

Nellie stared out the window where it had been for a moment longer, her heart bleeding and her chest aching. She softly pursed her lips and turned away, her shoulders slumping and her gaze fixed down at her feet.

_Don't you fucking __**dare **__cry in front of him, _she savagely commanded herself. _Don't you fucking __**dare.**_

"Ah, memories," Beadle Connor was sighing wistfully, looking at her with a toying combination of pity and delight. "That was your old establishment we passed by just a moment ago, wasn't it? Did you notice? Shame you decided to burn it to the ground---why, a bit of sprucing up, and it might have passed for a respectable business one day."

Nellie looked up at him, glaring, and a hatred blacker than any she had ever known smoldered behind her shining eyes.

"Burn in hell," she muttered, looking away.

The Beadle tsk-tsked, shaking his head lightly. "You may behave as vulgarly as you wish, my dear. You'll find it will not have the slightest bearing on your situation."

"It'll bloody well make me feel better," she snarled under her breath.

The Beadle chuckled softly. "I must admit, I rather enjoy my little encounters with your type," he smiled, his voice slipping into an involuntary sneer at the word _your. _"I find your particular…_class _of lady to be rather fascinating. _Looks_ like a woman, _walks _like a woman, but sounds---and _smells_---like a rabid sewer rat. Intriguing."

In spite of herself, Nellie closed her eyes and laughed once, snorting loudly.

"Yes, an' I bet you've 'ad _plenty _of _fascinating_ experiences with ladies of _my class_, sir. Why, a well-to-do bloke like yourself---you're prob'ly their ruddy _patron saint, _you are…_"_

Nellie didn't turn to look at the Beadle's face, but she could sense the glowering anger emanating from him like a palpable change in the temperature of the air. She couldn't wholly suppress a small smile.

_Ruffled your feathers, did I?_

"If you are suggesting, Mrs. Lovett," the Beadle muttered, clearly attempting to sound gentile but failing miserably due to the furious clenching of his teeth, "That a man of my stature would _degrade _himself to fraternizing with…with _unfortunate _circles of wom---"

"Oh, o' _course _not, sir. You are a _gentleman _after all," Nellie cut him off, turning toward him and smiling sweetly.

_Bullseye._

The Beadle's mustache bristled as if an electric current had coursed through it, fires of indignant rage welling up behind his steely eyes. Not only that…she was certain she detected a distinct hint of red flushing up his neck. Nellie smiled coyly, turning back to the window and crossing her legs in a lady-like manner, made all the more mocking by the somewhat ragged state of her skirt and the fact that she was in nothing but stockings ( and sans-corset to boot ). Nellie had seen Beadle Connor's type before…London was positively teeming with self-important men like him, men who put off as prim and perfumed and polished an image as they could, never dirtying their starched, gloved hands with anything. _Perfect gentlemen, _she smirked to herself. _They were all the same, every last one of them._ Take off all their pretty formalities, their pressed collars, their brass cufflinks, and right below the skin, each and every one of the pompous slimes was as filthy and hard-up and perverted as the next---and _they knew it. _Yes, she knew _exactly_ the sort of behavior that would infuriate a man like Howard Connor.

"You would do well, _madam_," he gritted darkly, "…to mind your _tone."_

Nellie turned to him, her face drawn in a dramatic, wide-eyed gaze of pleading desperation. She intentionally exaggerated her already coarse Cockney accent, making herself sound as indirectly ridiculous as possible.

"Oh, God in 'eaven sir, _do _f'give me! A poor, witless li'l buggah like me…why, I don' know _whot _silly rubbish is comin' outta me own mouf, 'alf the time! Oh, I beg ya sir, do _please _f'give me!"

The Beadle sneered, the rage bubbling visibly just beneath the surface. "My _dear _Mrs. _Lovett---" _he began to snarl.

"No, no, please sir, I _must _'ave ya pardon, I simply _must!" _Nellie continued mercilessly. "Such a magnanimous an' _well-respected _man as y'self….such _integrity…._I simply couldn' _bear _the thought of 'avin' in_sulted _you!"

The Beadle growled, and suddenly jerked his hand into the air, the back of his hand turned as if threatening to slap her. Nellie didn't so much as flinch. She only smiled politely, innocently blinking her eyes. It was all she could do to keep from laughing in his face as the Beadle visibly struggled to regain his composure, briskly straightening his cape and sniffing loudly, turning his face away from her.

"I forgive you," he muttered condescendingly.

Nellie smiled triumphantly and leaned back in her seat. _Patronization. _It was the Achilles heel of men like Howard Connor. The best part of the trick was that she need not say a single actual word out of line.

"Oh, _thank ya, _sir, _thank ya. _Indeed, sir, y'are a _most _prime exampleo' the f'_givin'_ Christian spirit."

It was visibly obvious that it was taking every ounce of the Beadle's self control to keep from going completely berserk. On the inside, Nellie was howling with laughter.

_Bloody bastard's got me where he wants me….least I can do is have a bit of fun._

"I suppose you think you're being very _amusing," _the Beadle sneered at her. "As if you were the first common wretch to think they could arouse my ire with ridiculous _taunting._ Well, my dear, I suspect you'll soon find yourself far more appreciative of that _Christian spirit _you so gaily mock_, _once we have reached the House of Records. Although it will do little good to attempt to explain to you the process…perhaps you shall simply have to wait until we arrive. Yes, only then will you fully understand the…_methods, _with whichI plan to complete this little investigation of ours."

Nellie's smile abruptly faded. As deeply as she wished to be brave, to be strong and unflinching, to do all within her power to spite the disgusting creature sitting in front of her…she was unable to deny the cold shiver of apprehension that coursed through her body. She was struck anew with the fearful, anxious sinking feeling deep inside her; fear for herself, for poor, truly innocent Johanna…for Toby, her dear, darling Toby…

_And most of all, for….._

She turned a final time to gaze out the window, lifting her eyes above the lighted silhouette of London rooftops, up to the eternal, starless black of the waning night above. Far, far away into the distance, almost farther than she could see…the faintest hints of sunrise were beginning to creep into the sky. Somewhere, out underneath that sky…._he was there._

_Be safe love, _she closed her eyes and prayed silently.

_Wherever you are….please….just be safe._

"Ah," the Beadle smiled, sitting up straighter and glancing out the window. "We've arrived."

Nellie turned quickly and looked out the other window. A hard, heavy lump formed instantly in her throat; she clenched her teeth and swallowed it, narrowing her brow and firming her mouth into a tough, straight line. There it was, just as it had always been; imperially designed with its high stone pillars and Gothic gargoyles, exclusively shut away from the commoners by its tall wrought iron fence. The mansion of the former Judge Turpin; enormous, lavish, cold, grey, and every bit as personable as a graveyard.

The door of the carriage was opened by a constable; Nellie saw the Beadle's smirking remark coming even before he said it.

"Ladies first."

"_Scumbags second," _she breathed, quietly enough that he couldn't hear.

Nellie was led, with some difficulty, out of the coach and onto Turpin's front steps by two constables…although, truthfully, they weren't Turpin's steps anymore. The filthy old vulture must have truly been given up for dead by now, if the city had gone so far as to seize his former property and convert it to a municipal building. Out of nowhere, a seemingly ancient memory popped into Nellie's mind; the image of the old Judge, lying on his back on her bakehouse floor, the shaving towel still hanging around his neck, splattered with blood from head to foot, Mr. Todd's razor wrenching free of his eye socket---she shuddered against the memory, swallowing thickly and taking the first step up to the mansion's ostentatiously grand front entrance. She glanced upward at the tall, menacing structure; a sign had been chiseled into the stone banner above the front door. It read _London Hall of Legal Records, _followed by the address.

"Yes, here we are at last," the Beadle was sighing contentedly to himself as they walked. Nellie shot him a venomous glare from the corner of her eye. "We've a great deal of work ahead of us, Mrs. Lovett, and precious little time to do it in. Fortunately, the home of the late honorable Judge Turpin proved quite advantageous to our purposes. Quite advantageous indeed---very interesting architecture, a great number of small, shut-away rooms, virtually tailor-made for---"

"_NO! NO! GET YOUR HANDS OFF ME!"_

The quiet of the London evening was ripped asunder in one shrill scream; Nellie whipped her head around to see Johanna being pulled from the second coach by three policemen, thrashing and kicking and making such a fuss that it was all the three men could do to keep her subdued.

"Officers!" the Beadle shouted. "Restrain her!"

"Let go me of me!! LET GO!"

As Nellie stared helplessly at the scene before her, the sheer terror of Johanna's screams pulling at even _her _jaded and time-hardened heartstrings…she was suddenly struck with an idea.

'"_A great deal of work, and precious little time to do it in?"'_

Nellie smiled.

_They've caught me. That much I can't help._

_But I sure as bloody hell don't have to make it easy for them._

"OOF!"

The constable on Nellie's right suddenly doubled over, crumpling to ground as she swiftly retracted her foot from his groin. The second constable immediately tightened his hold on her shackles, yanking her arms painfully behind her; she closed her eyes, braced herself, and jerked her head back as sharply and swiftly as she could. A dull jolt of pain flashed behind her eyes as the back of her skull smashed into the officer's face, but judging by the sharp cries of agony from her victim, she had a distinct feeling that his crushed and blood-gushing nose was causing him considerably greater anguish.

And just like that, in one single moment of chaotic frenzy, Nellie suddenly found herself without police escorts. She whirled around, breathing heavily, to see everyone---the Beadle, Johanna, and the remaining officers---momentarily paralyzed as they stared at her in shock. Nellie's eyes immediately found Johanna's and for an instant, wide, staring brown locked in perfect sync with wide, incredulous blue---and with a gaze of inexplicable understanding, Johanna narrowed her eyes and nodded. For that single instant, there was an unspoken pact between them.

_Go. Don't worry about me. Just __**go. **_

As if she'd received permission, Nellie turned and did the first thing her mind screamed at her to do. She ran.

Her arms were latched behind her, her hair whipped into her face and fell over her eyes, and her stocking feet slipped haphazardly on the icy cobblestones. But for a split second, when the frozen winter air was rushing past her face, Nellie had a moment of the most wild, jubilant hope she had ever experienced. For that single instant, it seemed possible…_just possible…_that she could escape.

"STOP!"

It was the Beadle's voice. Nellie nearly burst out laughing.

Then she heard it. _CHICK, CHICK, CHICK, CHICK CHICK CHICK CHICK._

"I SAID _STOP!"_

As quickly as the soaring hopes of freedom had come, they plummeted back to earth and died away. Nellie gradually slowed to a halt, staggering forward with her hands bound behind her, breath puffing out in white clouds. She gazed in front of her, down the muddy, lamp-lit street---down her path to freedom, so agonizingly close, she could practically taste it in the air---but no. She couldn't make a break for it, not now.

Nellie slowly turned around to face the crowd on the front steps, and sure enough, there they were; more than half a dozen revolvers pointed squarely at her in the hands of the policemen, cocked and ready to fire. Beadle Connor stood amongst them, his expression searing with the suppression of utmost fury.

He didn't speak. He simply lifted a gloved finger and beckoned her.

Cursing inwardly, her mind working furiously for some route of escape and finding none, Nellie slowly, obediently, began to walk back to her captors. _She had no choice._ The barrels of the guns stared at her like black, eyeless sockets, just waiting for an excuse to blink and pump her full of enough holes to let them see the glow of the streetlamps through her body.

The Beadle smiled. She stopped suddenly. _Wait._

The Beadle's smile vanished. "Come forward!" he snarled.

Nellie stood there stock still, not thirteen feet away from the ring of policeman and the noses of the pistols, hanging on the very cusp of her liberty, the tension in the air between them thicker than the stone they stood on.

_Wait._

"You won' shoot me," she said blankly, suddenly.

The Beadle blinked. "Oh, I _won't?" _he shouted viciously, turning abruptly and seizing the gun from the nearest constable, turning and taking several steps toward Nellie with the barrel pointed between her eyes.

Nellie felt her heart pounding furiously and her hands beginning to tremble as the point of the revolver drew nearer and nearer until she could _smell _the gunpowder. She closed her eyes briefly, swallowed, the urge to turn and run nearly overwhelming her; but she stood her ground.

She opened her eyes and stared Beadle Connor dead in the face.

"No. You won't," she said quietly.

"_Try me, bitch!!" _the Beadle raged, all pretense of his suave, proper demeanor stripped away so suddenly and frighteningly, it made Nellie cringe at a name she had been called a thousand times before without so much as batting an eyelid. She swallowed again, her mouth cotton-dry---but she refused to budge.

"You won' shoot me," she repeated, her voice quivering the slightest bit even as she fought to keep it calm. "Call me whatever you like, but I'm no fool. I know what you're takin' me in there for. No…you won' shoot me. You _need me._"

Beadle Connor was fuming, the gun beginning to shake noticeably in his hand. A full minute passed, every breath baited. Nothing happened. The corners of Nellie's mouth turned up ever so faintly.

"You see?" she smiled.

The Beadle emitted a guttural noise of impotent rage that was so raw and carnal, it seemed scarcely half-human. He whipped the gun away, turning and storming back the short stretch to the front stoop of the manor.

"No, Mrs. Lovett, for once, you are absolutely correct," he practically shouted, wrestling with his own voice in a fiendish attempt at regaining his composure. "You are far too valuable as _collateral_ for me to simply kill you before we've even started."

The Beadle pushed aside the guards holding Johanna on the steps. Nellie gasped sharply and cried out as she realized what was happening.

"_No!"_

But even as she ran forward, ready to give herself up at once, it was too late. Beadle Connor seized a handful of Johanna's hair and dragged her in front of him, ignoring her piercing shriek of pain. Nellie stopped dead in her tracks as the Beadle stared her straight in the eye and pressed the barrel of the gun into Johanna's temple. For one horrible instant, everything stood still.

"Indeed, Mrs. Lovett, I couldn'tshoot _you_," the Beadle challenged, a wild, savage gleam in his eyes, the upper half of his face shadowed demonically by the rim of his bowler hat. "But _she, _however, is of absolutely no further value to this investigation whatsoever. I have not a single thing to lose by shooting_ her."_

Johanna's eyes were wide and terrified; she clutched uselessly at the Beadle's hand, struggling in vain to pry his fingers from her scalp. She met Nellie's gaze, and her pleading, tear-streaked face burned into her heart like a vein of ice. The nose of the gun dug deeper into her temple, and she cried out again…

"_Don't!" _Nellie shouted, her voice ragged and desperate.

The Beadle eased off slightly, his leather gloves creaking as he released a fraction of the pressure. Johanna's chest heaved, gasping for breath as her gaze darted wildly back and forth between Nellie and the gun.

Her entire being crushed by the immovable certainty of defeat, Nellie walked forward, her head hung slightly, until she stood once more in the midst of the policemen.

"Please…don't," she whispered, her eyes squeezing shut, the sound of her own heart throbbing in her ears. "Please…I'll…I'll do whatever you want, jus' _please_…don't 'urt the girl."

_Not her….please, not Johanna….she's….she's all he has left…._

"Done!" the Beadle snarled triumphantly. "Take them inside!"

This time, _four _of the constables escorted Nellie forward, one on each side of her and two behind, pulling her arms so taut behind her that she winced and gasped softly in pain; if she so much as moved, any one of them could have snapped her arm like a twig.

The Beadle shoved Johanna, crying softly, into the arms of another officer, and together, the entire troupe passed beneath the broad, arching stone that had once marked the front door of Judge Turpin's home.

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

"Wh-what do you mean? Of course I won't leave you alone! It feels as if I've been trying to find you for ages! Mr. Todd? Do you hear me? Mr. Todd, are you alright??"

Sweeney felt his body seize and he began to tremble violently. Anthony's face blurred before his eyes, and his grip loosened from the collar of the boy's clothes.

"Mr. Todd!" Anthony caught him before he slipped down into snow, breathing hard with effort and turning him onto his back. Sweeney allowed himself to lean back against Anthony, his chest heaving at long intervals, his eyes wide and staring blankly up at the sky. Everything seemed to have slowed down dramatically. Barker was silent…if only for the moment.

"Mr. Todd, do you…do you think you can stand?"

Sweeney narrowed his eyes. He truthfully wasn't sure.

"Here, my friend…try to stand. I'll help you."

He felt Anthony's hands working beneath his arms and clasping at the front of chest. With a great strain of energy, he heaved, and Sweeney felt the ground fall away and press again squarely on the soles of his feet. The instant he was upright again he swayed dangerously, the world spinning madly around him. Anthony quickly grabbed hold of his shoulders, steadying him as best he could.

"Mr. Todd…you're shaking like a leaf," he muttered worriedly. "…here, take this."

With some difficultly, Anthony managed to slide his arms out of the heavy winter coat he'd taken from the farmhouse without letting Sweeney fall, hurriedly draping the garment over his trembling shoulders. Indeed---Sweeney had had no time to notice it before, but now that everything had become momentarily silent, he realized that his entire body was veritably convulsing with spasms of cold. After all, he had been out in the biting winter air in nothing but his shirt sleeves for God only knew how many hours. He accepted the warm weight of Anthony's coat without argument. He was so disoriented at the moment, besides, that the only thing he could focus on was keeping his gaze trained forward. He was suddenly aware of his arm hanging over Anthony's shoulders as the boy helped him to walk.

"Come, my friend…we have to get you out of the cold. Heaven only knows what you've been through…"

Sweeney opened his mouth to try and speak, but found he was unable to form any words. He resigned himself to being slowly helped along toward the sparse row of abandoned-looking cottages. As they trudged wearily along, his mind was racing.

_Anthony….how in God's name did you find me all the way out here?_

They came at last to the first house. Its doors and windows were boarded up, and the enormous snow drifts had made the front entrance next to impassable. Together they hobbled around to the first window.

"Hello?" Anthony called, banging his fist loudly against the wood. "Hello? Anyone? We need help! Hello?"

Sweeney summoned up as much strength and coherence as he could to mutter hoarsely under his breath.

"There's no one here, Anthony," he almost croaked. With every word he spoke, his throat ached and scratched.

Anthony glanced at him worriedly. "Where can we go? There can't be anything round here for miles…"

A sharp wind suddenly rushed past them, blowing dry clouds of snow at their backs and chilling them to their bones. Sweeney clenched his jaw briefly and closed his eyes.

"The horse," he coughed.

Anthony groaned, shrugging under his weight. "Of _course! _Why didn't I….alright, wait here just a moment, my friend, I'll be right back…" he carefully rolled Sweeney off of his shoulders, gently easing him down to sit with his back to the wall of the cottage, then turned and set off at a loping run toward the horse, which was lingering disinterestedly several hundred yards back down the beach. Sweeney watched through dim, half-lidded eyes as Anthony shrank into the distance, catching up with the horse and struggling to get hold of its reins as it skittishly trotted away from him.

"What will you do now?" he heard himself suddenly say aloud.

He closed his eyes wearily. "I could ask you," he muttered in reply.

"The boy truly cares for you," Barker murmured quietly. "He doesn't know…he doesn't know anything, does he?"

Sweeney's eyes shot open.

"Barker," he said, his voice barely a whisper. "If you tell him---if you try to hurt him, I swear---"

"No," he interrupted. "I'm not like you. This man…Anthony…he's the one, now, to make sure my Johanna is kept safe. I would never do anything to try and force them apart. He's all she has now in the world."

A short pause---then Sweeney felt the corners of his mouth turning involuntarily upward.

"But I say," Barker muttered through a slight, coy smile. "Is this a note of _concern _I'm hearing from you? _Sweeney Todd, _caring about another person_? _I can hardly believe it."

Sweeney stared blankly, barely noticing as Anthony at last caught hold of the horse. Barker gently shook their head.

"I suppose, like it or not…somewhere far inside, we'll always be the same person, Todd."

_Always…._

"I've got him!" Anthony was calling from a short ways off as he and the dapple grey jogged toward the cottage. "I've got him, Mr. Todd---"

Sweeney clenched his jaw firmly, his black eyes set like steel.

_I swear to God, Barker….if you even __**think **__about it…._

_I told you, _Barker immediately answered back, alerting Sweeney to the startling discovery that he could actually communicate with Benjamin inside his own head, _I won't tell the boy. I won't hurt him. I'm not like you, Todd._

_I'm not like you…._

"Mr. Todd?"

Sweeney blinked and shook himself once. He looked up to see Anthony standing in front of him with his arm outstretched, the other hand grasped firmly around the reins of the horse. Sweeney accepted Anthony's hand and grunted softly as he was pulled up to his feet, squinting dizzily for a few seconds.

"Are you feeling alright, Mr---"

"Anthony," he interrupted, his voice still hoarse, but some of his strength slowly returning.

_Anthony Hope…_the young man who had caught sight of him from the _Bountiful, _the man who had raised the alarm and saved him from his pitching, disintegrating makeshift raft, the man who had rescued him from certain death on the open sea. Anthony was one of the precious few people he had met in the world whom he believed---deep inside even his blackened, nihilistic heart---to be truly and scrupulously without malice or corruption. Honest, well-meaning, naïve Anthony Hope. Anthony _Hope._

_Is this a note of concern I'm hearing from you? __**Sweeney Todd**__, caring about another person?_

Sweeney felt a sudden, almost uncomfortable weight of realization settling inside of him. As strange as it was to admit it---Barker was right. It was the rare person---_rare indeed_---that Sweeney could bring himself to feel something resembling kinship for. Honest, pure-hearted Anthony Hope…perhaps the only person in the whole world that he was able to call _friend…_justa true, simple friend, the kind he had once had, back when he had been just as young and just as naïve.

He lifted his gaze to Anthony's face. "Anthony. You know you could call me Sweeney, if you liked."

Anthony's face went blank with surprise for an instant, then he raised his eyebrows and smiled faintly.

"Oh---I---of, of course. Sweeney," he added, clearly pleased at the novel sensation of forming his friend's first name with his lips for the first time. "I suppose I just never thought of---"

"It's fine," Sweeney cut him off again, taking a few steadying steps forward to the other side of the horse and bracing himself on it. The animal snorted and stomped its feet, then stood obediently still.

"But where can we go?" Anthony asked, meeting his gaze over the horse's back. "I've no idea what direction the nearest village is in. I scarcely know where we are _now…_I had no way of keeping my bearings through the night."

Sweeney thought for a moment, letting his gaze troll speculatively all around them. As he looked behind him past the row of seaside cottages, his eyes fixed at a single point to the North, where he spotted an abrupt break in the trees. He lifted his hand and pointed, leaning heavily against the horse.

"There," he muttered. "There must be a road running through the trees. If we follow it and keep to the coastline, I'm sure we'll come to a village. These houses wouldn't be built in the middle of nowhere."

Anthony craned his neck to see where Sweeney was pointing, and a relieved grin flashed across his face.

"Brilliant, Mr---er---Sweeney! If we set off at once, we may even be able to reach it before---"

"Anthony," he interrupted again. The boy turned eagerly to him, impatience flashing in his eyes.

"What? Mr---I mean Sweeney---we've got to get you someplace warm as _soon as possible! _It'll be a miracle if you haven't already caught your death of---"

"Before we go, there's something you must tell me."

Anthony stopped, his smile fading. "What is it, my friend?"

Sweeney looked straight into his face. His heart was suddenly pounding.

"Anthony---how did you find me?"

Even as the words escaped his mouth, he knew that it wasn't the question he truly wanted to ask.

Anthony suddenly looked at him with a mixture of seriousness and concern. He blinked twice and nervously wet his lips before answering.

"I followed the tracks of the horse, Mr---Sweeney."

Sweeney shook his head slowly. A blind man could have seen what Anthony was trying to hide.

"Anthony. You have to tell me the truth. _How did you find me?"_

Anthony averted his gaze uncomfortably. For a long moment, the silence was deafening. When he finally spoke, he kept his eyes pointed to the ground, his face hidden by his long hair. Sweeney stared at him without blinking as he listened to the words he had known he would hear.

"I'm sorry, my friend. I…truly…you must believe me, I truly thought it was for the best…I thought I was doing the right thing, I had no idea…we found him in London, when we came to see you…you were gone, and he…he told us…please, you _have to _believe me, if I'd have known that he was---what he was trying to do…I would never, never in a million years have helped him to…I'm _sorry----"_

"Anthony," he repeated, the gentleness of his own voice astonishing him. "It's alright. Just _tell me."_

Anthony hung his head even further, as if he were trying to disappear into himself. "He's got her, sir. Johanna, Toby, Mrs. Lovett…he's---he's got them all. I tried to stop him, I tried as hard as I….I couldn't. I'm sorry."

Sweeney stared at the crown of Anthony's head, his eyes slowly narrowing.

_He's got her. He's got them all._

He didn't have to ask who Anthony meant by _he_. For a single, weary instant, he closed his eyes, and the instant he did, he saw her face.

_Nellie._

In that single instant, he understood. He understood everything that happened. She had saved him. By sacrificing herself, she had given him time to escape. His eyes closed tighter.

"_Mrs. Lovett," _he heard himself whisper.

_Johanna, _he heard Barker's voice cry out inside his head. _Johanna…._

Anthony abruptly lifted his head, and his eyes were glistening with unshed tears.

"I'm sorry, Mr. Todd! Please, forgive me! I tried to stop him when I found out, I _promise _I did….if I'd had any way of knowing that he…that Connor…after you, and Mrs. Lovett…please, you know I would never have helped him! You---you're like family to me, Mr. Todd, both of you, you know that I would never---"

Sweeney looked up at him, and he realized for the first time just how much he truly did care about Anthony Hope. It was amazing….just how little he had really known about himself, about his own feelings, after all….Johanna, Anthony, Toby….

…_Nellie…._

_He's got her….__**he's **__got her…._

"Anthony."

The boy broke off his stream of despairing apologies and looked up.

"It's alright, Anthony," Sweeney said quietly. "You've done nothing wrong."

Anthony made a sound almost as if he were sniffling. "Sir? Mr---Sweeney?"

"We're not going to the village."

Anthony blinked. "What? What do you mean?"

Something inside Sweeney changed instantly. His sorrow and outrage, his inward storm of fury and despair at the thought of Nellie being held in Beadle Connor's filthy clutches had all vanished in the blink of an eye and been replaced with a single, uncomplicated drive. It had all come down to this…everything he had done in the last year of his life, everything he had destroyed, everything he had discovered, and everything he had tried to run away from…it had all led him up to this moment.

_He was going to get her back. And he was going to lay the ghost of Benjamin Barker to rest._

_Forever._

"Where has he taken them?" Sweeney demanded.

"To London."

_London. _Sweeney gritted his teeth minutely. Of course. No matter where he went, no matter what far reaches of the globe his life took him to---it would always come back to London. There was no place like it, after all….no place that would ever haunt him so completely.

"Where? Where in the city?"

"I think---I think I heard him say that he was taking Toby to an orphanage…" Anthony muttered, clearly struggling to remember. He suddenly looked up, eyes bright. "The _St. Peter's _Orphanage! St. Peters in Charring!"

Sweeney eyes narrowed menacingly. An orphanage. He had never been to an orphanage in London, but he'd known people who had, and he knew children who had been placed in them. There was a reason they were more commonly referred to as _workhouses. _

_Toby…just hold on…_

"And the others?" he asked quietly, his voice faltering imperceptibly at _others. His girl, his Johanna…and his…his…_

Anthony's face was suddenly drawn with a pale expression of horror.

"He's taken her…_them…_he's taken them to Judge Turpin's house," he answered, his voice barely above a whisper. "It's become the new House of Records."

Sweeney's heart skipped a beat. For a few horrible seconds, he stared in deathly silence over the horse's back at Anthony's face.

"Did you say…the _House of Records?"_

Anthony nodded. "What does it mean, Sweeney? What can the Beadle possibly want with them there?"

Sweeney didn't answer. He was staring at Anthony, but he was no longer seeing him. He was looking past him, somewhere far away, somewhere long forgotten and hidden away, buried deep within the shadows of his past.

"Sweeney? What's wrong?"

He barely heard Anthony's voice. He was suddenly short of breath, his black eyes glazing over as he was pulled deeper and deeper into the hellish memory of that day so long ago…

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

_The last thing he'd seen as he was being dragged away was her….Lucy, his precious Lucy, clutching tight to his beloved child Johanna as she cried shrilly. Lucy, staring after him with tears of horror and confusion in her eyes, surrounded cruelly on all sides by row after row of beautiful flowers….and then the Judge, Judge Turpin, as he approached her with a sympathetic eye and a kind, reassuring hand to her shoulder….he had seen them for only an instant, an instant long enough to feel the beginnings of an unquenchable fire of unspeakable rage that would smolder slowly inside of him every day for the next fifteen years----_

_But then, everything had gone dark as the club of one of the constables dragging him away came crashing a second time against the back of his skull, knocking everything into blackness._

_When he woke up, he was there.__The House of Records._

_He had woken up sitting upright in a straight-backed chair, his hands and legs tied. The bonds burned tightly into his skin, and his head was throbbing so badly he felt as if it were splitting in two. He was sitting in the middle of a tiny wooden room, lit only by the dim glow of a few gas-lamps. In front of him was a short wooden pulpit with a small desk on one side, furnished with paper and a typewriting machine. For a few seconds he fought in a confused frenzy against the bonds around his wrists, but was only able to inch the chair back and forth the tiniest fraction before his strength was exhausted. He was helpless He was trapped. _

_The next thing he knew, the door directly behind him was opening, and three people stepped inside, shutting it calmly behind them. The metallic sound of three locks clicking shut seemed to echo deafeningly in his ears. The three men came into view, and he stared at them in cold, silent dread. The first was Judge Turpin. The second was a clerk dressed informally in shirt sleeves, and the third was a uniformed constable. The Judge took his seat at the slightly raised pulpit, high enough so the he could just look down at the terrified Benjamin Barker strapped to his chair. The clerk sat down at the desk beside him and began readying the pen and typographer. The constable removed his cap and stood waiting at attention with his hands clasped behind him. After a moment of horrible, stilted silence, Judge Turpin leaned forward and spoke._

"_Take note. Sunday, June 24__th__, eighteen hundred and forty-nine. Session commencement, ten forty-one, pm."_

_The clerk immediately began taking the dictation on the machine, the metal keys punching rapidly and noisily beneath his fingers. Benjamin__stared up into Judge Turpin's shadowed face, gripped with silent fear. His breath was coming faster and faster and a cold sweat had broken on his trembling neck. He swallowed, his throat cotton-dry, and forced himself to summon up the courage to speak. _

"_What have I done wrong?"_

_Judge Turpin glanced up briefly, then lifted his hand and motioned calmly to the constable._

"_Officer."_

_**CRACK!**_

_Benjamin felt his breath fall away as the back of the constable's knuckles cracked against the side of his face. He blinked, hot pain coursing through him and welling behind his eyes. He turned to look again at the judge, his confusion multiplying by the second and his previous fear replaced with a new kind of terror---a terror mixed with the strange, inexplicable feeling that he knew already how all of this was going to turn out. And yet, still, he heard himself asking the question again, his voice growing more frantic and more desperate with every word._

"_But what have I done __**wrong??"**_

_**CRACK!**_

_The second time, the officer needed no instruction. Benjamin rolled his jaw, his eyes beginning to water._

_The Judge lifted a pair of reading glasses to his eyes and glanced down at a piece of paper._

"_Note. The prisoner has resisted arrest, attacked two officers, and become violently hostile during questioning, offenses which are to be compounded along with his initial charges."_

_Benjamin's jaw dropped, and for a moment he sputtered soundlessly._

"_I---I never---!"_

_**CRACK.**_

_He squeezed his eyes shut, tears issuing forth as he did. It was all he could to do keep from breaking down completely. Yes, he knew. He didn't know how he knew, but somehow---he did. He knew how this was going to end, no matter what he said or did._

_Judge Turpin cleared his throat. "Note. This, the written confession of the arrested, one, Benjamin Barker…male, age twenty-five, six foot…." Benjamin listened, utterly flabbergasted, as the Judge continued to list his description. The clerk copied everything with a furious, continuous clicking of the typographer._

_The judge removed his reading glasses and laid them down on the pulpit, folding his hands calmly and leaning slightly forward to look Benjamin in the eye._

"_Note essentials. Benjamin Barker, you have been accused and arrested for crimes of anarchy, acts of sedition, and high treason. You have been given this opportunity to confess, and with your confession the possibility of a benevolent sentencing. Will you cooperate?"_

_Benjamin stared, open-mouthed, up at the maddeningly calm face of Judge Turpin. _

"_What are you talking about??" he nearly shouted. "I've done nothing of the kind! How can I possibly be accused of----?"_

_**CRACK. **_

_He'd known the answer to the question even before he asked._

_The Judge, approaching and standing beside Lucy, his Lucy…the mournful, sympathetic gaze in his leering eyes, the gentle, comforting touch of his hand on her shoulder…_

_Anarchy. Sedition. Treason. Of course. All of the crimes for which evidence was exceedingly easy to forge and excessively difficult to disprove._

"_I'll ask you again, Mr. Barker. Will you cooperate?"_

_It was over. It had been over before the Judge had uttered his first words. And yet something kept spurring Benjamin onward…some nameless fear, some terrified, denying refusal to accept the inevitable, kept surging through him and rising up out of his throat in an incredulous cry---_

"_I'M INNOCENT! I'VE NOT DONE A SINGLE----"_

_**CRACK! BAM!**_

_This time, the constable's knuckles were followed shortly by another blow from the club---soft enough to leave him with his consciousness, but hard enough to bring stars to his eyes and a thick, swelling dizziness to fog his vision and take his breath away._

_After that, everything seemed to blur into an indistinguishable haze of pain and confusion. For a blank, unknown stretch of surreal emptiness, Benjamin knew nothing except the continual blows of varying types and forces that struck his body…fists, feet, clubs, knuckles, tools and blunt instruments…at one point, he wasn't sure if it were only one officer systematically beating him, or two. Only one thing remained completely constant throughout the process; no matter what else happened, he could always hear, as if from a distance, the monotone, whirring click of the typewriter. Whatever happened, when he had next fully regained his senses, he was again strapped into the chair with no one else in the room but the judge, the constable, and the clerk. One of his eyes was swollen shut and he was bleeding from both ears._

_Judge Turpin looked back down at the papers on his desk._

"_Note. After much hostile resistance including the violent assault of a third police officer, the arrested has confessed fully to all charges and will await a full trial, to commence at a later date. Session concluded; Monday, June 25__th__, two o'clock am precisely."_

_The clerk finished copying out the record of confession and handed it to the Judge, who inspected it once, handed it back with a nod of acceptance, stood up, and left the room. Benjamin stared down at the floor in front of him in a blank, unseeing stare, breathing heavily, his head spinning and his entire body aching. At that moment, he knew nothing…nothing except that it was over. Everything was over._

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

"Sweeney? What's wrong?"

Anthony's voice broke through his consciousness like a rock through a window. He jerked his head up, heart pounding.

"There's no time to waste. We must go---_now."_

"_Now? _My friend, you aren't strong enough! Shouldn't we at least wait until---"

"NOW, Anthony!"

The young sailor started. "But Sweeney, what _is _the House of Records? What is the Beadle planning to do with them?"

"Come round to this side," Sweeney barked sternly, ignoring his question. Anthony obediently crossed to the other side of the horse.

"But Mr. Todd---"

"Hands together," he ordered quickly, not giving the boy time to speak. Anthony looked at him questioningly, then understood, getting down on one knee and lacing his fingers together to make a step.

"Mr---I mean---Sweeney?"

Without a word, the barber planted the heel of his boot in Anthony's waiting palms and pushed himself up onto the horse, swinging his leg around the straddle it and take hold of the reins. The animal snorted briefly, but remained in place. Before Anthony could say a word, Sweeney had extended his arm toward him and was staring at him instructively with his dark eyes.

Anthony looked slightly puzzled, but reached up and took Sweeney's arm in his own, and with their combined strength, they managed to heave him up onto the horse as well, seated closely behind his older companion. Sweeney barely waited until Anthony was in position before digging his heels into the horses flanks. The old dapple grey whinnied shrilly as it took off at a slow gallop in the direction that Sweeney guided it. Anthony sucked in a sharp breath and quickly seized Sweeney's shoulders in his hands to keep from flying off backwards.

"Mr. Todd!" Anthony said loudly over the muffled galloping of the horse's hooves as they plunged through the snow. "How will we get back to London if we don't know where we are?"

"The river," Sweeney answered, narrowing his eyes forward. "It continues on due west of here. The horse must have traveled east all of last night; if we follow the same path backward, we'll come to the farmhouse; then we can find river, and we'll follow it west back to the city."

Either Anthony was satisfied with this explanation, or he could think of no further arguments; whatever the case, they rode on in stilted silence for several minutes. After a long, contemplative moment, Anthony spoke; softer than before, so that Sweeney had to glance quickly backward and strain his ears to make out the words.

"Sweeney. What _is _the Beadle planning to do with them?"

Sweeney narrowed his brow and looked back ahead of him. All around him, glimpses of black memories seemed to follow behind the horse like bats---the small, dark room, the judge's calm hand as he directed the constable---the dull flashes of pain, the sharp stabs of the horrible knowledge that nothing he did or didn't do made any difference….

"Sweeney?" Anthony said quietly.

He stared blankly forward. _Nellie…Johanna…._

"He's going to force confessions from them," he answered quietly.

He felt, rather than saw, Anthony's eyes widen fearfully.

"F-force? What do you mean _force? _You---you don't mean he's going to---?_"_

Sweeney didn't answer. He only tightened his grip on the reins, the leather creaking between his clenched fingers, and shouted fiercely at the horse as he spurred it to greater speeds with his heels. They took off at a flourishing gallop across the snow-covered fields, the wind whipping their faces and Anthony's fingers digging deeper into Sweeney's shoulders. After what felt like a long moment, the boy suddenly leaned forward so that his mouth was close to Sweeney's ear; he whispered, his voice small and urgent, and in his few words, Sweeney knew he understood.

"_Hurry, _my friend. _Hurry."_

A/N; Ok…so this is the first chapter where I've really felt the dangerous fingers of anachronism creeping up on me. Generally speaking, Sweeney Todd isn't particular to any one specific time period, though it is obviously Victorian---I just decided to plug it into the 1850s-60s to make the whole Barker's confession scene seem more realistic ( ha, as if realism is what a musical goes for ^^ ). But anyway, I apologize if some things seem historically out of place. ( like the clerk---I looked it up and they really did use typewriters then, but does it still seem too modern to anyone? I dunno….) Oh well. Hope you liked the chapter! Reviews make me smile!


	25. Chapter 25

A/N; Good news, everyone! The muses of fanfiction all got together one night and decided to gang up on me with attacks of inspiration, so I'm getting this chapter out sooner that I'd hoped! Enjoy! And a very Happy New Year to everyone, but most of all to my loyal reviewers! ( you know who you are, wink wink 0_^ )

Disclaimer; I don't own Sweeney Todd. You don't own Sweeney Todd. But maybe by 2009, we'll all have managed to make peace with this fact.

Chapter 25

_A Cage of Many Rooms_

or

_He Feels You, Johanna_

It was mid-afternoon---the sky above them was a brilliant, cobalt blue, cloudless, the sun beaming down on them in the strange, eerie brightness that only a winter's day can possess. They had been riding for almost five hours when Sweeney finally spotted it---the familiar buildings sitting quietly on the horizon, the great looming shape of the barn, and the little farmhouse behind it. It was an odd string of events indeed, that had led to he and his having come to such intimate terms with the house of a total stranger. Even now as he cantered toward it, Sweeney felt in some minute way as if he were headed home….or at least, to something very much resembling home.

"The horse needs to rest," he called over his shoulder to Anthony, who jerked as if he had fallen into a slight doze. _Can't blame him…he __**was**__ up all night running…._

"Huh? What is it?" the sailor yawned.

"I say _the horse needs to rest," _Sweeney repeated roughly, but patiently. "We'll take it into the barn and let it rest and feed for an hour."

"_You _need to rest, my friend," Anthony urged groggily, jumping straight to the point in spite of having just woken up.

Sweeney clenched his jaw and shook his head.

"Trust me, son," he muttered darkly. "I've been asleep for half a lifetime."

Anthony narrowed his eyes. "What do you mean?"

Sweeney ignored the question. The horse slowed to a trot as it approached it's familiar home; it snuffed and snorted as it went through the gate, eagerly approaching the barn doors. Anthony eagerly jumped down first, taking the horse by the reins and guiding it into the semi-darkness of the barn. Once they were inside, Sweeney climbed down after him, grimacing against the irritating stiffness in his limbs. He stretched his shoulders wincingly, looking about him as he did.

_It was so surreal…to be back in this place, again…._

His gaze fell absently on the hayloft, and images of the last time he had been there sprang instantly to his mind…_Mrs. Lovett…Nellie…lying innocently before him, clad only in her white nightgown, her head rolling limply to one side and bits of hay already sticking in her wild red hair. Her chest was rising and falling ever so shallowly with her unconscious, rhythmic breath…_

…_Nellie…_

_Her face was instantly in his mind, the gentle turn of her mouth, the soft, sad smile of her eyes as she looked at him and spoke in that tired, hushed breath of a voice…always gentle, always practical, always caring…_

"_Now, Mr. T….surely one's enough for today?"_

_Mrs. Lovett…Nellie…his---_

"Sweeney, are you hungry?"

He blinked, jerking away from the pull of his memories. He couldn't let himself think of her…not like this…not now, when he needed his head clear and his will unbreaking…_no. As much as he wanted to…as much as he truly, impossibly wanted to….he couldn't think of her. Not now._

He look at Anthony, who was standing by the open door of the barn.

"My friend, _are you hungry?" _he repeated, a note of concern evident in his voice and his face.

Sweeney looked at him silently, then nodded once, more out of complacency than anything. Anthony nodded firmly in reply.

"I'll see if I can find any food in the house. I'll be back in a moment."

The sailor turned and set off briskly for the little farmhouse, and Sweeney turned and wandered aimlessly through the barn. He gave a passing glance to the horse, which had already found its feedbag from the wall in its old stall and was busily crunching away, despite the bit in its mouth. His shoulders went slack and his gaze pointed blankly at the floor. He felt---strange. He wasn't tired, and truth be told, he honestly wasn't hungry, even though he knew he should be starving after not having properly eaten in well over a day---but no, it wasn't either of those things. He just felt---_strange. _As if he didn't know _what_ emotions he should be feeling. It had been so long since he truly cared about someone---about _anyone---_about any_thing_, other than his revenge---that now, as he thought of Nellie, and Johanna, and Toby, and Anthony, about all the people who need him---about Nellie, most of all---how was he _supposed_ to be feeling?How was he supposed to be feeling---about _her?_

_It wasn't the realization that he wanted to live that truly astounded him._

_It was why he wanted to live._

_He wanted to live so that he could look into her wide, childish brown eyes and say the words he couldn't possibly say, the words that would finally destroy Benjamin Barker forever. _

_I love you._

Sweeney looked up at the hayloft above him, at the rays of yellow sunlight streaming through the cracks and windows of the barn. He watched the clouds of tiny, drifting dust particles, lit like glowing flecks of gold in the shafts of light. As he stared up at it, his eye suddenly caught the edge of dark, soft shape, up among the hay, and he was distracted with a burst of memory.

_The carpetbags…of course._

Without pausing to think a second longer, Sweeney was up the ladder and standing in the hayloft, looking wildly about him until he spotted it---the only bag, the only shred of their property that had survived the flight from London. He felt to his knees and began to rummage through its last meager contents, searching, hoping…_praying._

_Let it be there…at least one, please, let it be there…._

As he pulled aside the last of the bag's small articles, his face and his spirits plummeted, and he slowly leaned back, looking at it blankly.

They were gone, all of them. The last of his razors were gone. The last remnants of his old life---of his old _self---_they were gone forever.

As he kneeled there silently in the hayloft, his mind wandered away from him.

_That was it. His friends…they were gone. Gone forever. He had nothing left._

He looked up, up at the shafts of golden sunlight.

_No. He had something._

"Mrs. Lovett," he said quietly, his face pointed upward. "I---I---_I---"_

_Tell her. Tell her you love her._

_I can't._

Sweeney looked down, his face blank with a sudden, overwhelming kind of remorse.

_What…what if he couldn't?_

_What if, when he came face to face with her, when he finally had her back again….what if he couldn't say it?_

"What if it isn't true at all?" he heard himself say aloud.

For once, Barker's puppeteer-work of his mouth didn't anger him. It pained him_. _The words resounded in the silent barn like an echo, dampening down over his heart and filling him with a breed of anxiety that he hadn't felt since he couldn't remember when.

_What if it isn't true?_

_What if it isn't true??_

"I told you, Todd," Barker said softly, and Sweeney dared to believe that for some unfathomable reason, there was actually a tone of pity in his voice, "You'll love her forever, just as I will. You'll never be able to love someone the way you loved Lucy. You can _betray _her---you can tell yourself she's gone, you can tell yourself you've moved on, you can lay with as many women as you like---it won't make any difference. You'll never be able to forget her. And you'll never be able to say those words to anyone else."

_I love you. _

_**Tell her.**_

_I can't._

Sweeney stared forward, the fear and despair growing inside of him like a weed, wrapping around his heart, choking out its beat.

"No," he said quietly. _It is…I know its true….I don't know how, I don't know why, I---I don't know when…._

No. He didn't know when. He didn't know how. He didn't know what to think about it, how to handle it. All he knew was that somewhere along the line…somewhere, at some indistinguishable moment between a glance here, a soft word there, a gentle laugh, a comforting hand, a misty gaze…all he knew was that _somewhere…._

_He had fallen in love again._

_It was impossible. But it was true._

_He had fallen in love with Mrs. Lovett._

"Nellie," he whispered.

"Have you ever been able to call her that?" Barker said sharply. "To her _face?"_

Sweeney looked down. He didn't answer, but he knew full well the sad truth even before Barker said it for him.

"_No. _You _haven't. _I've told you, Todd. You'll never be able to forget Lucy. Never. She's the one thing we'll always share."

Suddenly, slowly, Sweeney lifted his eyes. He looked back up at the hayloft---he watched the floating, golden specks of dust. He watched the bales of hay that he, and _she, _and Toby, had slept on together, what felt like a thousand nights ago.

"Barker," he said quietly.

As if in reluctant, but respectful acknowledgement, Barker nodded their head once. "Yes."

"Will you wait?"

Barker blinked. "Wait?"

Sweeney stared up at the rays of light, his face sad and determined at the same time.

"I know that you're going to try and kill us, Benjamin. I know there's nothing I can do to stop you from trying. I just---want to ask you if you'll wait, until I've---until I've gotten them back."

_Silence._

Sweeney narrowed his gaze, wishing he could reach up with his hand and take hold of one of the beams of sunlight. _Nellie…Toby…._

"Please, Benjamin," he whispered. "Wait until I have them back."

_Silence. _For a long moment, nothing…but silence. Then---

"For Johanna, Todd," Barker answered quietly. "For her, and no one else. I'll wait…I'll wait until my daughter is safe with the boy again."

Sweeney slowly closed his eyes. It was strange, but at that moment---for the first time, as he spoke to the ghost of Benjamin Barker, he couldn't find within himself even the smallest trace of anger.

"Benjamin," he said. "You know that---I never wanted anything---but to see them again."

The horse clopped one hoof on the dirt floor below the loft. It was the only sound in the barn.

"I loved them, Benjamin. I…_we…_loved them. You know that."

He opened his eyes.

"Deep down…no matter what we do, now matter how much we might deny it…we're the same man, you and I, Sweeney Todd," Barker whispered.

_The sunlight…Nellie, waking beside him in the hay…._

"_Mmmmm. Where in the…bloody 'ell….Mr. T?" _

"Until Johanna is safe with him," Benjamin said softly, finitely. "I'll wait."

Somewhere, hidden deep within him, Sweeney wanted to---he didn't, but he _wanted---_to smile.

_Nellie. I __**know **__it's the truth._

_I'll find a way to say it. Somehow._

"Thank you, Mr. Barker."

A sudden noise at the doorway made him jump and jerk his head toward it. Anthony stood there, half a loaf of bread and a jar of what looked like preserves in his hands. He was staring up at Sweeney with a blank, anxious expression.

Sweeney's lip curled slightly and he inwardly cursed himself. _Damn it…how long had the boy been standing there?_

"Sweeney," Anthony said quietly, taking a few cautious steps into the barn. "I---I found these," he held out the meager provisions. "It was all there was left. I'm sorry I took so long, I---th-the bodies…I didn't see them last night, and they startled me---"

Sweeney's sharp look instantly softened. "Thank you," he said blankly, walking to the ladder and calmly climbing down it. He went to the edge of the stall and sat down in a small clustering of hay with his back to the wooden partition, letting his shoulders slump and his forehead rest in his hand. Anthony followed suit and sat down beside him. For a moment, there was nothing but tense silence between them as Anthony tore the bread in half and opened the jar, placing it on the floor between them.

"Here," he said, offering the bread. Sweeney accepted it, attempting to feign a smile of gratitude, but failing to muster anything but a small nod. He held the bread in his hands, looking at it, unable to force himself to eat it. _It didn't make sense…he should have been ravenous, but…he simply wasn't. He couldn't bring himself to even think about food._

After what felt like an hour of stilted silence and dull, muffled chewing sounds, Anthony swallowed and suddenly looked up, his young, innocent eyes full of questions and unspoken fears.

"Mr. Todd," he said softly, and Sweeney slowly lifted his head and returned his gaze. He looked into the boy's face, his own blank and expressionless as wood.

"Yes, son?"

"If…if you don't mind my asking, sir…who is Mr. Barker?"

Sweeney stared.

Outwardly, there was no change in his appearance---he didn't even so much as blink at the mention of the name---but inside, a jolt, a charge, like a streak of ice and electricity combined, pierced him through, and his heart was instantly in his mouth. He looked at Anthony in blank stillness for a only a few seconds---but in those few seconds, an entire era had passed through his brain, and in that single instant he made a decision. He was suddenly, briefly, put in memory of something that had happened some time ago…back when he and the woman and the boy were still in the pie shop. He remember something he had heard faintly through a doorway…hushed voices, whispering sadly in the next room…

"_Toby, there are….things….about Mr. Todd, and I, that you don't know."_

"_Things?"_

"_Yes, love. Things. And some of them…some of them aren't very nice." _

He remembered Nellie's voice, quiet with suppressed tears, only a few moments later…

"_Mum," Toby had whispered, his voice shaking and barely audible. "Has 'e…has Mr. Todd…killed…other people, too? More people than the Judge, and the Beadle?" _

"_No, darling," Nellie had said quietly. "No one else."_

Sweeney blinked, Anthony's face still waiting patiently, worriedly. Those young eyes, still so full of hope…still so certain that there was decency left in the world…

As he looked into those eyes, he understood. He understood why Nellie had lied to Toby, why no matter how much she wished to, there were some things he could simply never know.

_Anthony…Johanna…._

_My child, _Barker's voice whispered in his head. _My precious child…._

_He understood. There were some things he would never be able to tell them. That look---the look of hope, in Anthony's eyes---he couldn't let it fade away. As much as it hurt him, as much as that part of him wished to do it---he couldn't tell them the truth. He had to let them keep their hope._

He turned away from Anthony and stared off emotionlessly in front him.

"Anthony," he said quietly, his voice calm, gravelly, and low. "I'm going to tell you something that's going to frighten you."

Anthony's eyes widened and his brow narrowed. He leaned back slightly. "I'm…listening."

Sweeney didn't turn, didn't show the slightest hint of expression. His face was as cold and empty as stone.

"I am the one who killed Judge Turpin and Beadle Bamford."

For an incredibly long moment, there was nothing. He didn't look up at Anthony's face, and so he didn't know how the boy had reacted---he only knew that for that seemingly endless moment, there was nothing but deathly silence.

Then there was movement.

In the blink of an eye Anthony had jumped to his feet, backing away from Sweeney and looking down at him in wild, fearful disbelief, shaking his head as his chest began to rise and fall faster.

"No," he said, the desperate refusal in his voice palpable. "No. No. That's a lie."

Sweeney didn't move. His blank expression never faltered. He looked up at Anthony with the simple, unalterable gaze of the truth.

"Yes, Anthony," he said quietly. "I'm the one who killed them."

"_No!" _Anthony shouted, whirling around and pacing back once, then returning, pushing his hair out of his eyes. "_No, _it's not possible, it…it can't be, it _can't be!"_

"Calm down, son," Sweeney said, his voice a deep monotone.

"But…but then…it's _true?" _Anthony whispered pleadingly, looking down at him with a miserable incredulity in his angry eyes. "What Johanna saw…in your barbershop…the man, the…the _murder__…._that was _real??"_

At the mention of his daughter's name, the memory of that horrible night burned fresh in his mind, and on the inside, he screamed in agony. But on the outside, he simply stared.

"Yes," he said.

Anthony was shaking his head even as the inescapable truth was visibly sinking in.

"Then…the murderer…the man, c-covered in blood…the man---the _nightmare, _that's been haunting her night and day for the last…that…_that was---??" _

Sweeney did nothing---didn't nod, didn't speak. Anthony backed away a few shaking steps, his face drawn in slowly dawning horror.

"Mr. Todd," he whispered, his voice hoarse and on the verge of trembling. "You…then _you…you almost __**killed her??"**_

Inside his head, Benjamin Barker cried out miserably. Outwardly, Sweeney Todd didn't so much as blink.

"Anthony. You must try to understand. If I had known…if I had _recognized _her, I would have never---"

"You…_MONSTER!" _Anthony suddenly shouted, his face twisted in rage and despair. "_You…you tried to----!"_

Sweeney calmly rose to his feet. Anthony flinched and backed away as if in preparation to defend himself. Sweeney simply walked toward him.

"Stay away from me!" Anthony cried fiercely.

"Anthony," he said calmly. "Look at me."

"I said _stay away! Stay away or I'll---"_

"_Anthony."_

He reached out and took the boy by the shoulders, forcing him to hold still. Anthony went rigid in his grasp, gazing fearfully into his eyes like a trapped animal.

"My friend," he suddenly whispered, his anger vanishing immediately and replaced with sorrow. "You…you didn't…_how could you---?"_

"Anthony," he said, tightening his firm grasp on his shoulders and looking him straight in the eye. "Listen to me. I would _never do __**anything **__to hurt her."_

Anthony shook his head, staring at him despairingly. "But Sweeney…you…you almost…"

"I _almost," _he said gently. "But I _didn't, _Anthony_. _Please, _try _to understand. I _didn't know it was her."_

A fraction---just the _tiniest _fraction---of tension slowly eased from Anthony's shoulders.

"Mr. Todd," he said pleadingly. "Would you---would you have honestly killed her?"

Sweeney paused. He looked into Anthony's wide, despairing eyes…he thought of that night, of the chest, of the terrified boy, of the blade held menacing in front of her eyes….

"_Forget my face."_

_It didn't matter. He had seen it in the lad's terrified eyes; he would never speak of what had happened to anyone. He would never pose any kind of threat. Not to Sweeney Todd._

He looked back at Anthony, and for the first time, his chiseled, cold expression broke into a faint look of astonishment, for he realized that was he said next was the honest truth.

"No," he said quietly. Anthony blinked. "I wouldn't have."

He slowly let his hands fall down to his sides. Anthony didn't move.

"Why?" he asked, his voice quiet, but desperate; desperate to find a trace of the man he had only a moment ago had every faith and confidence in. "_Why, _my friend?"

Sweeney's gaze softened. He put his hand on Anthony's back and guided him back toward the side of the stall---they both sat down again, the boy staring at him expectantly, waiting, hoping.

For a short moment, they were both still.

"Anthony. You asked me who Mr. Barker was," he said quietly, looking down at the floor.

Anthony nodded. Sweeney closed his eyes---just for an instant. _Here it came. The lie. The lie that would spare them both, that would keep their innocence alive---if only for a bit longer._

"His name was Benjamin. Benjamin Barker. He was a very…dear…_friend,_ of mine." Sweeney took a deep breath, then let it out slowly.

"He was Johanna's father."

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"No! No, please, I beg of you…_please…"_

"_Dry up!" _the constable escorting her barked harshly. "Crying will do you no good, miss."

"But I _can't _go back there, I _can't---" _Johanna sobbed miserably, the tears streaming down her face. "_Please, _you don't understand---"

"I said _quiet!" _the constable shouted. Johanna bit her lip, silencing her hysterical cries, but unable to stop the fearful tears as they rolled continually down her cheeks. She looked all around her as the policeman guided her through the narrow, twisting halls---the dark, horrible halls that were so strange-looking, and yet so frighteningly familiar. All of Judge Turpin's things had been removed. His expensive, ill-cared for furniture, his Persian rugs, his shelves full of books, his dozens of paintings and picture frames, his rose-tinted glass light shades…everything, it was all gone. The lamps had been replaced with bright, square, informal gaslights. The walls had been stripped bare, and all of the judge's intricate murals had been painted over with dull, blank off-white. The floors were naked as well, nothing now but dark wooden boards that creaked underfoot. Every room that Johanna glanced into as they passed had been converted from lavish luxury to plain, bone-bare efficiency---nothing now but desks, office supplies, straight-backed chairs, long tables, business cabinets, and row upon row of record books and legal files. Indeed, the only similarity to its old self that the mansion now bore was the fact that save for herself, Mrs. Lovett, the Beadle and his officers, the place was completely devoid of life.

But none of its drastic changes made the slightest difference to Johanna. No matter what had been done to the interior of the house---every room, every hall, every doorway she passed through, struck her with the exact same shades of horror and utter loneliness that she had been plagued with the first fifteen years of her life. No, it made no difference at all---to her, this house would always be the same.

_A cage. A cage of many rooms._

"Here," the constable said gruffly, coming to an abrupt halt in one of the third-floor hallways. He took a ring of keys from his belt and unlocked the door, opening it and pushing Johanna inside. She stumbled, but managed to keep herself from falling. She sniffed, her whole body trembling as she looked around her. She was in a room so tiny that it might have once served as a walk-in broom closet---but now it had been stripped bare of anything it might once have contained, and there was nothing in it but a wooden bench. It looked for all the world like a wooden prison cell.

Then, slowly, horribly slowly, it dawned on her. She remembered this room. The last time she had been inside it, she had been only seven years old, but she remembered---_oh, she remembered---_it was the tiny, pitch black room that she had been locked inside of for hours at a time whenever the judge determined that she had been naughty. She remembered sitting curled on the floor, shivering in the dark, crying alone for hours until her punishment was over…

"You'll stay here until the Beadle has need of you," the constable muttered. Johanna looked at him with a wild panic in her eyes.

"You can't leave me here!" she cried. "Please, I beg you, _don't leave me here alone!"_

The constable chuckled darkly to himself as he closed the door but for a small crack through which she could see his amused face.

"You can scream and shout all you like in here, miss," he smiled politely. "This room's been sealed with lead all the way 'round. Ain't nobody in the world who'll hear you make a fuss."

He closed the door. The room was thrown into total darkness.

"NO! PLEASE!" Johanna shrieked, throwing herself against the door and banging frantically with both fists. The last thing she heard was the click of several locks closing shut; then, nothing.

"_PLEASE! PLEASE, I'LL DO ANYTHING YOU WANT, ANYTHING! Just __**please….**__please don't leave me here….don't leave me here alone!!!"_

_My cage has many rooms…._

It was hopeless. Johanna turned her back to the door and slowly slid down it until she was seating on the floor, hugging her knees, her face buried in her folded arms as she cried continually.

_Anthony….Anthony, please…help me…._

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

Anthony stared in disbelieving silence. Sweeney's eyes were closed, his head hung forward and his arms resting wearily over his knees. All around them, the afternoon sunlight was streaming into the barn…but he had long since forgotten it.

"By the time I found out…it was too late," he lied quietly. "Lucy---" his voice began to falter; he paused, forcing himself to continue without breaking down. "---by…by the time I found out…she was already gone. And their daughter…Johanna…he had already taken her. Adopted her…like his own."

Anthony was slowly shaking his head. "Mr. Todd…_Sweeney…_I…I had no _idea…"_

Sweeney opened his eyes, and he didn't realize it---but there was a faint light shining in them, a single point of light shining in the blackness. With the lie that he told next, he could finally withstand it no longer, and his stoic mask began to disintegrate.

"I loved them, Anthony, all of them…I loved them like my own family. I--I never told her, but…there was a time, when we were very young, when I thought…I thought that Lucy and I…might be married."

He suddenly felt a firm hand on his shoulder---he looked up, startled to see Anthony watching him with a gaze of the utmost sorrow and pity. For a moment, he felt a pang of unbelievable guilt that everything he had just told the boy was, in a way, a lie. _It's to protect them, _he told himself over and over. _It's to protect them._ He closed his eyes again, swallowing, struggling to maintain his blank expression.

"Barker, and I, we…we'd been friends as long as I could remember. We'd planned to open our own barber shop, together, and when he…when he and Lucy were married, I…I was happy for them. I truly was. When Benjamin was taken away, I…I tried to be there for her, and for Johanna," he whispered, the half-truth so palpable a thing, he could nearly taste it. "I couldn't. I found out too late, and by then…by then, the Judge had already…"

"Stop," Anthony said gently, his hand grasping firmer. "Stop, my friend."

Sweeney looked down at the floor. For the first time in a long while, Barker had gone completely silent, even in his head.

For a long moment, _everything _was silent.

Then, Anthony was on his feet again. He stood over Sweeney, his face set in a steeled mixture of determination and sadness. He gently held out his hand. Sweeney looked at him for only a moment…then took his arm, letting himself be pulled to his feet. As he stood openly before him, Anthony looked directly into his face.

"Benjamin Barker was the man you spoke to me about, wasn't he?" Anthony asked gently. "That day when were first arrived in London together. It was Mr. Barker, wasn't it?"

Sweeney only looked away.

"My friend," Anthony whispered. "Why didn't you _tell _me? When I first came to you and asked you to help me hide Johanna…why didn't you tell me?"

Sweeney opened his eyes halfway, averting his gaze from Anthony's eyes.

"I never wanted you to be a part of it," he answered. "You, or Johanna…I never wanted you to know any of it…about Benjamin, or Lucy, or what I was planning to do…"

Anthony smiled, slowly, wearily.

"Mr. Todd."

_A lie…all of it a lie, and yet true, at the same time…a half-truth, to save them both…_

"Sweeney."

He looked up. He couldn't believe it…Anthony was _smiling. _It was faint, but there, all the same.

"Thank you, my friend."

Sweeney said nothing. He only stared. Anthony reached out and held him by the shoulder, squeezing lightly.

"_Thank you. _For everything."

Sweeney shook his head once in disbelief.

"Anthony," he said gravely. "You understand that I am a _murderer. _I've _killed _two men."

Anthony looked away, his smile straightening slightly, but not vanishing.

"I know," he said quietly. "But I believe…I believe, my friend, that there is such a thing as redemption. And I believe, that no matter what…you are a _good man, _Sweeney Todd."

Sweeney only stared at him, unable to speak. _A good man?_

"I believe that I spotted you on that raft at sea for a reason, my friend," Anthony smiled. "I believe that maybe, just _maybe…_you and I were meant to find each other. To _help _each other."

He gave Sweeney's shoulder a final tightening of his fingers, then let go and walked away. Sweeney stood where he was, the words echoing in his mind, his eyes glazed and staring off at nothing.

_A good man? Him?_

He turned his head and watched behind him as Anthony coaxed the horse out of its stall, turning it around and taking a saddle from the side of the stall, strapping it on as best he could.

_A good man?_

Sweeney narrowed his eyes incredulously.

_The fool…the poor, naïve fool._

Anthony at last mounted the horse, stepping up awkwardly with the aid of a small footstool and swinging his leg haphazardly over the saddle. Once he was situated, he trotted the few feet forward and held his arm out to Sweeney once again.

"Come, my friend," he said firmly. "We'll go, and we'll put an end to this, once and for all…we'll end it _together."_

Sweeney looked at the hand, outstretched, waiting for him.

_I believe that you are a good man, Sweeney Todd._

He reached out and took the arm. Moments later, the two of them were once more thundering across the snow, the wild snorting and the galloping hoof beats of the horse the only sound between them and the freezing air rushed past them. Sweeney held tight to the reins, his head down, eyes forward, thinking.

_A good man? Him?_

He clenched his jaw. _No. He would never try to fool himself into believing that. He was a murderer. A cold-blooded killer, not only of guilty men, but of innocent men, as well…truly, innocent men. He could see that now. A good man? No. He was a murderer. A monster. And he would never try to tell himself otherwise._

_But maybe…._

He remembered something, something he had once told himself, back when his heart had been consumed entirely with nothing but the blackness of his own hate.

_I will have vengeance….I will have salvation…._

He narrowed his eyes and kicked the horse with his heels, spurring it on faster and faster across the fields.

_He had gotten his revenge. And it had done nothing for him. He had been left every bit as empty and alone as he had been before._

"_I believe, my friend, that there is such a thing as redemption."_

_Redemption. Salvation._

He had gotten his revenge.

Now, perhaps there was a way----some small, impossible way, but a way nonetheless---_perhaps, there was some impossible way---_

_---that he might find the salvation he had promised himself._

He lifted his face and looked off to the horizon. The sky was growing dark, the colors of twilight washing the horizon in front of them as they traveled continually west. Far beyond them, miles into the distance, he could see it---the beginnings of the dirty suburbs, the dark lines of thousands of rooftops, the black smog of a million chimneys rising like a shroud above the seemingly endless expanse of civilization. _London._

They ran toward it. They ran as fast as they could toward the city, toward the end---the end of everything, and maybe, just maybe---the beginning of something new.

_I'm coming for you, Nellie._

And suddenly, without any struggle at all, he discovered that he could say it. If only to himself, if only in a whisper so quiet that no one but he could hear---he could say the words.

"_I'm coming for you…my love."_

A/N; Maybe instead of _A Cage of Many Rooms _or _He Feels You, Johanna, _this chapter should have been named _Multiple Dialogue Flashbacks. _Oh well. ^^Not only do reviews make me smile, they also encourage me to update sooner! You know what to do!


	26. Chapter 26

A/N; Sorry that this chapter is a little shorter than the other recent ones. I kind of wanted to give exclusive focus to this one particular scene, because there's a _lot _of information in it. And I apologize in advance for the Beadle's excessively long chunks of dialogue---they were ( unfortunately ) necessary. _ Hope you like it anyway!

Disclaimer; I don't own Sweeney Todd. You don't own Sweeney Todd. Let's go watch the movie and then cry ourselves to sleep.

Chapter 26

_At the Beginning Again_

or

_Ladies, My Lord, Are Weak_

Suddenly, there was a sound.

_Click click._

Nellie swiveled her head around to see the door behind her, the only entrance to the small room, calmly being opened. In stepped Beadle Connor, followed by a small man with glasses at the end of his nose who was struggling to carry an enormous stack of yellowed-looking papers. Nellie narrowed her eyes, swallowing silently. She cast a glance at the constable across the room, who had been standing there at attention since she'd been brought there. His eyes never left her, his thickly knuckled hands never straying far from the revolver at his hip.

"_It's true, li'l lady," he'd muttered darkly when they'd first been shut up in the room together and she'd backed against the far wall, eyeing him fiercely like a caged dog eyes the dog-catcher. "True enough, that the Beadle 'as explicit orders for you to be kept alive. 'Owever…" he had slid his fingers, almost caressingly, over the handle of his pistol, smiling gently as he did; "…'e also specifically mentioned that it don't make one bit of difference whether you've got both your kneecaps, or not."_

_Nellie had done her best to glare venomously at him…but all the same, a very real shiver of fear coursed through her as she looked at the black gleam of the gun barrel in the soft lamplight. She had gone and stood by the barred window, watching the constable from the corner of her eye, her hands still hanging in shackles behind her back._

_And that was there they'd stayed…the entire day. The room they'd been placed in was fairly small, with nothing in it but a long wooden table, several straight-backed chairs, and bookcases. There was no clock in the room, but Nellie guessed that it was about noon when she leaned against the far wall from the officer and slid down until she plunked wearily on the floor. Her head tilted back and rolling on her shoulder, staring out the window, the shadows of the bars wrapping around her from head to toe. She let her eyes fall half-closed, her whole body limp, exhausted, and aching from hunger pangs. She watched the color of the sunlight streaming through the glass and the bars go from grey dawn, to white morning, to yellow midday, to the dim, goldenrod glow of dusk. The entire day, she didn't budge an inch. She just sat there, staring, every few moments casting a halfhearted glance at the officer and the pistol. The minutes dragged agonizingly by. It was twilight when the Beadle finally made his appearance._

Beadle Connor walked briskly, almost cheerily, into the middle of the room, his heeled boots clunking noisily on the wooden boards. He clapped his hands and rubbed them together, smiling heartily. He was dressed only in his shirt-sleeves and a very expensive-looking blue silk vest, and for the first time Nellie saw him without his navy blue bowler hat. She didn't bother to suppress one corner of her mouth from quirking bemusedly upward as she looked at the bright shine of his very bald head ( ringed with only a thinning backup of hair the same dark, blonde color as his mustache ) in the gleam of the lamps.

The Beadle, evidently, did not notice.

"My, my, my, _my!" _he ejaculated, grinning prosperously down at her as if she was a business associate who had just offered him the contract of a lifetime. He cut a very different figure when seen without his menacing cape, gloves, cane, and hat. In fact, if she hadn't known better, she would have thought for the moment that he looked like a rather agreeable older gentleman. "What an _interesting _day this has been!"

Nellie scoffed lightly and let her head roll away from him, looking back out the window with an apathetic dullness.

"'Ow lovely," she muttered carelessly.

The Beadle ignored her blatant disrespect, swiftly turning and taking the stack of files from the bespectacled man and placing them on the table, fanning several of them out in front of him. He sat down at the table and began leafing through them with the exuberant energy of a schoolboy.

"Yes, yes," he was saying to himself, practically bubbling over with happiness. "A _most _interesting day, in_deed. _Officer, would you please invite Mrs. Lovett to take a seat?"

Nellie's eyes popped open, and she jerked up her head in time to see the constable, who had been as stone-still as a Buckingham guard for nearly the last fourteen hours, come marching across the room to seize her by the arm and wrench her painfully to her feet.

"You 'eard the Beadle, _ma'am," _he sneered, dragging her to the other side of the table and pushing her into a chair. "'Ave a _seat."_

Nellie shot him a defiant glare, but soon forgot about him as she looked up across the table at Beadle Connor, who had begun to whistle to himself as he straightened the stacks of papers. For a long moment, she simply sat there and stared at him, hands bounds behind her, hair loose and frizzing out in all directions, tendrils hanging over her eyes, even more unkempt and wild than usual, her face bruised and dirty, her stolen burgundy dress torn and nearly slipping off of one pale shoulder. After a full five minutes of reading and patient, infuriatingly cheerful whistling, the Beadle glanced up at her. He _tsk-tsked._

"Dear, me, Mrs. Lovett," he remarked, not unkindly, as his eyes scanned briefly over her and then turned back down to his papers. "We really ought to have you cleaned up a bit. Got to have you looking presentable when our dear Mr. Todd comes to visit, now, mustn't we?"

Nellie narrowed her eyes. All of her reason told her that he was bluffing, and that she couldn't let him succeed with it…but that didn't keep a sharp freeze of panic from jolting through her, anyway.

"Yes," she answered warily, looking at him through suspicious, defensive eyes. "I 'spose we must, mustn' we?"

The Beadle nodded, his face tilting in a close-mouthed smile that made the corners of his mustache turn upward.

"Certainly, we must. Manners, you know, Mrs. Lovett, are the backbone of society."

"While we're on the subject, sir," she muttered darkly, her gaze piercing straight into him, searching for a tell. "'Ow is it you 'appen to be so sure of 'is coming 'ere? You send 'im an invitation?"

Beadle Connor laughed brusquely, never once looking up from his paperwork.

"Oh, _no, _I hardly think there's any need for _that, _Mrs. Lovett," he said jovially. "I'm sure he'll be arriving---completely of his own accord---before the evening is through. And our young Mr. Hope, as well, I shouldn't wonder."

Nellie's heartbeat skipped, and the harshness of her faced melted away. Her lips parted, her eyes widening fearfully.

_Anthony? He…he wouldn't have….__would he??_

The Beadle was grinning to himself, shaking his head. "Ah, my poor, poor Mrs. Lovett…would you be very much offended if I offered you a bit of advice? The next time you're going to whisper secret instructions to someone regarding the whereabouts of a fugitive, take care not to do it in front of two officers of Scotland Yard, eh? Their hearing is a tad better than one might think."

Nellie gaped at Beadle Connor as he continued to look over his papers. A cold, hollow pit of dread formed instantly in her stomach, and her entire body went rigid. She cursed herself inwardly.

_Fool! You bloody, fucking FOOL!!_

_What did you think the boy was going to do?? Find Mr. Todd, and then simply __**not **__come back to London to rescue Johanna? You bloody, fucking, __**fool!!**_

She just sat there, mouth open, unable to speak. The Beadle looked as if he were positively on the verge of giggling.

"Yes, Mrs. Lovett, if I know my deranged scoundrels…which I _do…_Mr. Todd will have set out for London the instant our dear, well-meaning little Anthony told him where to find you."

Nellie's lips moved soundlessly for a moment as she struggled desperately to regain her composure.

"What…" she cleared her throat, trying to look calm, and knowing that she was failing. "…ah…what makes you so sure of that? Why, Mr. Todd, 'e…" she paused, staring down at the wood of the table. _What she was about to say next…was she lying, or was it---?_

The Beadle calmly glanced up at her. "What was that, dear lady?" he smiled softly.

Nellie looked up at him, swallowed a thick lump in her throat.

"…Mr. Todd, 'e….'e doesn't give 'alf a tic about me," she finished, her voice threatening to fail. She quickly looked down again. All of a sudden, her eyes were stinging.

_Was she lying---or was it the truth?_

The Beadle laughed again.

"How terribly humble of you, Mrs. Lovett," he said almost gleefully. "Unfortunately, your uncharacteristically modest statement is wasted on me. It doesn't take a man with more than ten years of study in the criminal psyche to see that Mr. Todd _will, indeed, _be coming for you."

Nellie jerked her head up, her eyes angry and shining at the same time.

"And why is that?" she demanded fiercely, an inexplicable pain aching in her heart as she said it.

_Mr. Todd…Sweeney….would he….would he honestly come for her? Was all of this a trick?_

_He wouldn't….no, he would never….would he? For __**her?**_

"One sees it all too often, I'm afraid," the Beadle continued, his voice artificially grave. "I've even written a book on the subject, if you care to know. You see, Mrs. Lovett, men of Mr. Todd's sort…_serial murderers, _that is…they tend to fall into one of three psychological categories. One, they truly care about _nothing, _and do what they do simply out of an insane, purposeless enjoyment of killing. Two, they care---in a twisted, unhealthy manner---about _everything, _and do what they do because they honestly believe it is a just and righteous act in an unrighteous world. Or _three, _they care about _one _and only_ one thing, _and they do what they do in order to protect and please that _one_ _thing."_

Nellie listened, her heart pounding, her gaze never wavering from his down-turned face.

"It is plainly obvious, judging from your maneuvers up until this point, that Mr. Todd is of the third variety of killer," the Beadle stated matter-of-factly. "And I believe, Mrs. Lovett---for God only knows what reason---that his particular object of purpose, is _you."_

Nellie's eyes widened.

One half of her was terrified…terrified that if the Beadle was right, then that meant Sweeney…her Sweeney…really was on his way back to London, back straight into the eagerly waiting jaws of the lion.

The other half of her wanted to laugh in his face.

_She…she, __Mrs. Eleanor Lovett….__**she, **__was the object of Sweeney Todd's purpose? __**She **__was the one thing in life that he cared about, the one thing that he did everything for the sole reason of protecting, of __**pleasing?**_

Out of nowhere, an image came to her mind…she, and Mr. Todd, lying together in the hayloft as she hugged him and kissed his face, blubbering like an hysterical idiot.

"_Sweeney. I have to tell you something," she had cried, kissing him over and over, her eyes and nose running, her head covered nearly in more hay than hair. "I love you. I love you Mr. Todd. I love you so much."_

_When she had told him that…when she had poured out her soul to him, offered him everything she had to give, laid her very heart out at his feet….had he said anything?_

_Had he said so much as a single word in return?_

_Had he so much as even __**looked **__at her?_

_She, Eleanor Lovett, the only thing Sweeney Todd cared about in the world?_

_Please._

The tears formed in her eyes and ran silently down her cheeks. She didn't care if the Beadle saw them. She had come, quite suddenly, to the not-so-startling realization that she simply didn't care about anything anymore. She did what she really wanted---she opened her mouth and laughed.

For the first time since they'd sat down, the Beadle looked up at her. The confident grin vanished from his face and was replaced by astonished annoyance.

"You _disagree, _Mrs. Lovett?" he sneered, his patience faltering ever so slightly.

Nellie kept laughing. _It had been far too long since she'd had a decent, good old-fashioned jolly_, she'd decided. As much as it hurt her, she gave herself over to it completely. The tears continued to roll down her cheeks as she giggled uncontrollably, leaning forward and actually letting her forehead hit the table. _Clunk. _

"Mrs. _Lovett," _the Beadle murmured, rising anger evident in his voice. She ignored him.

Nellie snorted loudly, her shoulders trembling as she squawked and howled, the sounds of her hysterical laughter muffled somewhat beneath the table.

"Mrs. _LOVETT!" _the Beadle snapped.

Nellie finally lifted her head up, her eyes red and bleary with tears. She giggled for a few seconds more, relishing the insidious surge of anger bristling in Beadle Connor's mustache.

"Y-you…ha…haha…you…_._you ruddy _git!" _she said, the words almost choked out by spurts of laughter. She sputtered, giggling uncontrollably, when the Beadle's nostril's flared furiously.

"My _dear Mrs. Lovett!" _he ground through his teeth.

"You…you great, bloomin,' _witless---"_

"MRS. LOVETT!" he practically screamed.

She wasn't finished. "Y-you….you _actually think, _that 'e…that Mr. Todd…you actually think 'e's going to come back 'ere to rescue _me? _You…you're outta your bloody stinkin' _mind!" _she cackled, shaking her head amazedly back and forth.

Then, she saw something she had never seen before. Beadle Connor actually managed to _calm himself down. _He was on the verge of snapping---his cold eyes seared with rage, a vein in his temple throbbing madly, his fingers quivering with the obvious struggle of refraining from striking her---and in the blink of an eye, his rage subsided. He took a breath, exhaled, and smoothed the front of his vest, slowly lowering himself back down into his chair. Nellie's trailing giggles faded gradually as she watched him, until finally they once more sat eye-to-eye in stilted silence.

"Prattle on as colorfully as you wish, my dear," the Beadle said, sniffing once in distinguished disdain. "It makes no difference how fine an actress you fancy yourself to be. I have seen men like Sweeney Todd. I've seen them a _hundred _times before…mark my words, Mrs. Lovett, I _know _what makes a man like Sweeney Todd do what he does. And although I cannot possibly fathom _why _he would attach such merit to a wretched filthy cuss such as yourself, he _does. _Fear not, my dear. Mr. Todd _will be coming for you. _And when he does, we'll be _waiting."_

Nellie only glared at him in silence, the tears drying on her cheeks.

_He won't come for me, _she told herself, forcing herself to believe it with all her heart. _He won't. He wouldn't. He __**won't.**_

_He __**won't come for me.**_

_He'll stay where he's safe._

_Oh, please, God….let him stay where he's safe!_

"However," the Beadle spoke up again, every ounce of his bright, cheerful manner regained. "As invigorating as all this is, it is not the reason I came to pay you a visit, my dear."

Nellie's ears perked up, and she watched him anxiously, waiting.

"No, no…what I came to visit you for was to inform you of a _very fascinating _little discovery I made while investigating the late Judge Turpin's legal records concerning our other darling houseguest."

Nellie's eyes widened the smallest fraction.

_Johanna…_

"Yes…little Johanna Turpin, who on _earth _would have guessed?" the Beadle chuckled once, opening a file in front of him and scanning it lazily with his eyes. "The little wench mysteriously goes missing, and a few months later, _what _a coincidence…she turns up like magic, tangled up in the _very _case I am set to investigate! Funny world, isn't it, Mrs. Lovett?"

The small man with spectacles, who had been standing inconspicuously near the door for the last fifteen minutes, suddenly slipped outside, shutting the door behind him. Nellie noticed in the corner of her eye, but could spare only the barest glance before turning back to focus all of her attention on the Beadle.

"…and of course, it poses quite the interesting little problem, now that the honorable Judge has been declared legally dead," Beadle Connor rambled on. "You see, Mrs. Lovett, it says here in his records that some years ago, Judge Turpin's will was amended to stipulate that his entire fortune---stocks, savings, everything last shilling he had to his name---should, in the event of his death, be inherited to his adopted ward and only living family, _Johanna Turpin."_

Nellie wet her lips. Her heart was pounding. Every few seconds she found herself glancing rapidly at the barred windows. The sun was sinking lower and lower, the city bathed in ever-increasing darkness. She wasn't sure why, but she suddenly felt an inherent dread at the thought of the oncoming night.

"That's _quite _a sum of money to be left to a girl of no more than seventeen," the Beadle remarked, still smiling calmly to himself. "By the way, Mrs. Lovett…I don't suppose you ever heard the _story _behind Johanna Turpin's adoption, did you?"

The words dropped in Nellie's stomach like rocks. She whipped her head back to look at the Beadle, staring at him in silent disbelief. _The story? He couldn't…he couldn't possibly know…Lucy, and Benjamin, and…how in the world could he??_

The Beadle's smile widened at her obvious incredulity. He leaned back slightly in the chair, folding his hands on the table and looking her straight in the eye.

"A fascinating little story, I assure you. I'm one of the few people who know the _real story, _in fact. You see, the general cover-up was that the Judge found her in an orphanage when she was naught but an infant, and that he was so overcome with pity and so smitten by her charming loveliness that he adopted her as his own, honest and noble as anyone of his stature might adopt any little orphan girl."

Nellie stared, scarcely able to believe what she was hearing. _The way the Beadle spoke…it was almost as if…_

"You see, Mrs. Lovett, the truth is---there are precious few people who I've told this to, mind you…you ought to count yourself very lucky---the truth, you see, is that I never wanted to be a Beadle, when I was a young man growing up. Oh, no, I had much higher dreams than that. I wanted to be a lawyer. And not just any lawyer---a white knight of justice, a champion of the people, a scourge to criminals and evildoers alike. I applied to the Oxford College of Law more times than I could count, but tragically, they never accepted me. I graduated from college, burdened with terrible student loans, and suffice it to say I took the first decent job that came to me. I became a constable, Mrs. Lovett. A common policeman no different than our friend in the corner, here."

Nellie swallowed. Her throat was dry. She shot a frantic glance to the window. The sun was nearly down.

"But you see, Mrs. Lovett, even as a humble officer of Scotland Yard, I had my ambitions. I wasn't going to live out my life as a lowly dog of the Yard, herding the miserable sheep of this city to and fro every which way for the rest of my days. No…I was going to make something _better of_ myself. I first met Judge Turpin almost twenty years ago, when I was involved in the arrest and interrogation of an embezzling executive on the court payroll. I…well, you might say I did the Judge a _personal favor _in that particular instance. The Judge wasn't in a position to deliver the sentence he really wanted---he'd fallen on times of bad popularity among the other seats at court, you see---and I took it upon myself one evening outside the courthouse to personally make sure the embezzler paid _most dearly _for his crimes. You know what they say, eh, Mrs. Lovett? Eye for an eye, _tooth for a tooth?" _the Beadle laughed jovially to himself, and Nellie cringed in a combination of fear and disgust.

"But anyhow," the Beadle continued, settling himself back in the chair again. "Either way, I began to operate very closely with Judge Turpin after that. Over the course of several years, we became something in the manner of friends, he and I…he always enlisted me to work as a police force in his most private cases. Well, about---let's see, what was it now?…ah, yes---about sixteen years ago, the Judge came to me---as well as a few other select men of Scotland Yard with whom he kept close confidence---he came to us with a very urgent, very private, very _confidential _matter. He knew of a man who had committed grave offenses of treason and sedition, who must be arrested immediately and quietly, to avoid causing a most unnecessary stir amongst the common rabble, should the nature of his crime be made known. I was among the officers who _personally _arrested this man, and I myself was granted the privelege of being the sole officer involved in the man's criminal interrogation by the Judge. To this day, I take great pride in the fact that it was my…_forceful, _coaxing, that garnered from this man his full confession. The Judge himself complimented me on my most effective methods of persuasion."

Nellie had fallen very silent and very still. Her chest and throat ached as if she wanted very badly to cry, and her mouth hung open just slightly, her lip threatening to quiver as she stared in disbelief. _It couldn't be...it couldn't...._

"And truly," the Beadle went on, "...the most _heart-warming _reward of all, was when I learned that the Judge had found enough Christian pity within him to actually _adopt _the criminal man's poor infant daughter after Mrs. Barker's untimely death soon after the arrest of her husband. _That _is the true origin of our little Johanna Turpin, Mrs. Lovett. Naturally, the true story of her parentage was to be kept a secret between the Judge and his confidence of officers involved. He was far too humble a man go about, parading his good deed for the public to see. No, he covered up the shameful truth about Johanna's family, about her criminal father, for her own well-being."

Outside, the sun had disappeared, and the city was bathed in black. Nellie's heart pounded like a drum as Beadle Connor leaned forward in his chair, resting his arms on the table and smiling eerily at her.

"And do you know who that criminal father _was_, Mrs. Lovett?"

Nellie's eyes had begun to tear again. Slowly, horribly, she shook her head no...but it was a lie. She knew too well the name he was going to tell her. She trembled as she listened to him speak the impossible words.

"He was a man named _Benjamin Barker."_

Nellie closed her eyes. One tear fell.

The Beadle smiled maliciously.

"I thought so," he murmured quietly, grinning from ear to ear. "Yes, you know perfectly well who Benjamin Barker was, don't you Mrs. Lovett? Legal records are truly invaluable things. There is _so _much to be learned by a simple day's glancing through paper documents. Business files, building applications…they have _so much _to teach us."

Nellie squeezed her eyes tighter, as if trying to block out his words. _No, no, no, no…._

But she couldn't. He continued to speak in his low, threatening mutter, leaning forward and staring at her with that horrible, perpetual smile.

_It was a circle. All of it. A terrible circle that had taken more than fifteen years to complete._

"For example, my dear…if it weren't for my fascinating exploration of our legal files, I might never have learned that your dirty, homely little pie shop was, _in fact, _the residence and place of business of Benjamin Barker sixteen years ago. I might also never have known, that _you yourself, _along with your late husband Albert Lovett, purchased the building from Lucy Barker after the transportation of her husband, and that it was _you, Mrs. Lovett, _who cared for the infant Johanna after the death of her mother and before her merciful adoption by Judge Turpin."

Nellie opened her eyes. She wanted to speak, but there were no words. She simply looked into Beadle Connor's face with a blank, emotionless stare, contemplating how it was possible for such a deluded creature as him to even exist.

The Beadle chuckled softly to himself.

"_Most _interesting, indeed, Mrs. Lovett. You know, it is a seldom occasion indeed that I find cause to admit something such as this, but…the truth is, when I first began this investigation, I was not, in fact, able to prove with one hundred percent certainty that Mr. Todd _was _responsible for the deaths of Judge Turpin and Beadle Bamford."

Beadle Connor suddenly stood up, clasping his hands behind his back and wandering casually to the window, looking out over the dark city streets. Nellie stared at the back of his bald head. She couldn't see his face, but she could hear in his voice that the oily smile had not slipped away, even for an instant.

"But now, all the threads of the tapestry have fallen into place. You, Mr. Todd, the Judge, Johanna Turpin, Anthony Hope…it all makes sense. I can see the whole picture, as clear as day, Mrs. Lovett. It's quite remarkable, truly…all this time, I was certain that Mr. Todd was the fiendish mastermind behind this inhuman plot, but _now…_now I see that the person behind it all, Mrs. Lovett, is _you."_

Nellie didn't even blink. She just stared.

"_You, _Mrs. Lovett. Who in their right mind would have dreamed it? And yet there it is, every piece, laid out before me. I do not know how or under what circumstances you and Mr. Todd found each other, Mrs. Lovett, but however your relationship came to be, the moment you met him, you knew you had stumbled upon the opportunity of a lifetime. Someone _else _to do the deed, someone _else _to take the blame, should the time come. And _then, _when you stumbled across the poor simpleton Anthony Hope, _then, _you had everything you needed. You knew that Johanna had been adopted by the Judge. All you needed to do was let Anthony catch a single glimpse of the girl, and he would be ensnared. A pretty little thing like that, a lustful young man in his prime---it wouldn't take a miracle for them to fall in love. And I'm sure it was no great task for you, with that silver tongue of yours, to convince the boy that Johanna was being mistreated and in desperate need of rescuing. Of all the absurd nonsense…but, then, I suppose young people are so _ridiculously _predictable these days, aren't they, my dear? Any matter…once Anthony and Johanna were in love, it was a simple matter of removing the Judge from the equation. I don't know how you did it, but somehow, you lured the Judge to Mr. Todd's parlor, as you did his close confidant, Beadle Bamford, and then---well, that was the end of _them, _wasn't it? You set your dog, Mr. Todd, on them, and they were as good as dead the moment they walked through the door. Then, you needed only to wait until Anthony and Johanna were married and the Judge was declared legally deceased. After that, all of his assets, the whole of his vast fortune, would be left to Johanna. Tell me, Mrs. Lovett…how did you intend to get it from them? Did they know the whole scheme from the beginning? Were you planning to split it between you, half for them, half for you? Or were you simply going to wait until they'd collected, then have Mr. Todd murder _them_ in cold blood as well, and take the entire treasure for yourself?"

Nellie stared blankly. She didn't even try to make any argument in her defense against the ridiculous accusation.

The Beadle turned to look at her, and when her silence continued, his plastered smile actually straightened. He narrowed his eyes firmly at her, the cold steel flashing in his gaze.

"No matter," he said quietly, returning to stand at the table, looking down at her empty, tear-streaked face. "I'll know all the details, soon enough." He turned his face toward the closed door.

"Come in, please."

Nellie slowly turned her head to look.

The door opened, and in staggered the small bespectacled man from before. He was bending under the weight of a portable typographing machine, which he hurriedly set down on the table, exhaling loudly. He turned and locked the door shut behind him, then sat down and began preparing the typewriter for dictation.

Nellie turned and looked back up at the Beadle, and a numb feeling suddenly spread through her body. She had known this was coming. Since the moment she'd been brought to this place, she knew. This was what she was here for. This was why she was still alive. He didn't just want her arrested and tried for murder. That wasn't good enough. He wanted her to squirm. He wanted her to scream. He wanted her to writhe in agony, to fall before him on her knees and beg for mercy before it was finished.

He wanted a confession.

The Beadle calmly loosened his cufflinks and slid up his clean, white sleeves. He gently cracked his knuckles, smiling as he stood over Nellie, looking down at her.

She turned away from him and closed her eyes. _What did it even matter, anymore?_

_Let the bastard have his fun._

"Yes, your plan was perfect, my dear," the Beadle was muttering, his low tone concealing the obvious excitement at the work to come. "Until you made one, grave mistake."

He leaned down and whispered, with his mouth so close to her hear, she could feel the brush of his wiry mustache.

"_You killed my brother. You tested the wrong man, Mrs. Lovett."_

Beadle Connor looked up. He nodded to the stenographer, and as he spoke next, Nellie heard the rapid whirring of fingers punching the keys.

"Take note. Taken verbatim, the written confession of the arrested, Mrs. Eleanor Lovett."

Nellie kept her eyes shut and her face blank. She wasn't in the room with the Beadle and the clerk and the constable anymore. Her hands were no longer in shackles. And it didn't matter that he would never love her the way that she loved him. For once, in her mind…it didn't matter. She was no longer in the room…no longer in the world.

_She was with Mr. Todd. She was with her Sweeney. The sun was bright through their windows. The shore was warm and soft at their doorstep. And the sea at their horizon was the deepest shade of blue she had ever seen in her life._

_You and me, Mr. T…we can be alone._

_We can be alone, my love._

The Beadle whispered in her ear a final time, quietly enough so that there was no clicking of the keys.

"And when I'm through with _you_, my dear…I'll start on _him."_

A/N; I gotta say, one of my biggest outstanding problems with this fic is that I can't think of a suitable fate for Beadle Connor that I think will satisfy everyone's seething hatred of him. So, just for fun…why don't you review and tell me what you'd most like to see happen to him in the end? Let out your vicious side! ^_^ And even though I can't _promise _I'll be able to take any viewer requests on this matter, you never know…if I get a _really _good one that just happens to fit in with the plot, I might just be tempted to make it work! So, as always…reviews make me smile!


	27. Chapter 27

A/N; Warning---this chapter has some rather vivid scenes of abuse in it ( as far as a T rating goes, anyway ). Don't want to discourage you or anything, just a friendly heads-up. Hope you like it!

Disclaimer; I don't own Sweeney Todd. You don't own Sweeney Todd. Neither of us will _ever _own Sweeney Todd. But so help us, God…we will write non-copyright-violating fan fiction about Sweeney Todd.

Chapter 27

_The Hole In the World_

or

_Nothing's Going To Harm You_

_There's a hole in the world, like a great black pit, and the vermin of the world inhabit it…._

"Sweeney?"

He blinked, shaking himself, and was suddenly overcome with a staggering sense of déjà vu. He looked down at his hands, the reins of the horse held loosely in his fingers…he looked down at his feet, standing on the grimy cobblestones. He noticed something near the heel of his left boot---he glanced over at it minutely. It was a dead rat with its legs in the air. He narrowed his eyes at it and lifted his gaze back up to the lonely street in which they stood---a slim, dirty, alleyway that wound and wrapped between two series of brick buildings. On either side of them the walls were plastered with torn and weathered paper advertisements. The sun was sinking rapidly behind the rooftops, the lamplighters already starting to make their rounds. Very shortly after that, the "unfortunate" women would begin doing the same. Sweeney stared forward down the filthy brick alley, his face hardened into a cold, grim mask.

_No…there's no place like London…_

"Sweeney?" Anthony repeated lightly, looking at him over the back of the horse. "Are you alright?"

Sweeney didn't look at him as he spoke. "Yes," he said quietly. "I'm fine."

Anthony nodded slowly, a faintly suspicious tilt to his gaze. "If you're sure, my friend." He turned and looked behind them. "Alright," he said, exhaling, steadying himself. "Alright…if I'm not mistaken, Bell Court is about three quarters of a mile from here…if we take this street straight on through and then turn onto Hilford's for nearly half a mile, it should take us to Fleet Street and then there's a direct passage to---"

"No," Sweeney interrupted. Anthony paused, turning his head quickly.

"No?" he asked incredulously. "What do you mean, _no? _I thought we…"

But he trailed off slowly when he saw the look in Sweeney's eye. The distant, empty look, that spoke of sorrow and iron-hard determination at the same time.

"Mr. Todd?" Anthony asked, his voice nearly a whisper.

Sweeney's eyes saddened even further as he gazed down the alleyway, piercing straight through the miles of brick and stone to the prison where she waited for him.

_Hold on, _he wanted to say. _Just hold on a bit longer._

He turned to his younger companion.

"I'm sorry, Anthony. We must get the boy first."

Anthony blinked in surprise. "The boy---you mean _Toby?"_

Sweeney nodded, grasping the reins of the horse and turning it around in the narrow alleyway, leading it back to the street. Anthony stood frozen in shock for a moment, then hurriedly followed after his mouth hanging open in protestation.

"But, Mr….Sweeney…what about Johanna? And Mrs. Lovett? Toby is---he's safe at St. Peters! Sweeney, we must go to Bell Court _immediately! _What if the Beadle has already---"

Sweeney spun around, his face stern, but not angry, looking Anthony straight in the eye and cutting him off with a firm look.

"I know how you feel, son," he said gravely, locking gaze with Anthony for only a moment longer, then turning and continuing to the street with the horse, talking as he went. "I want to go there as badly as you do." Immediately after he said this, Sweeney realized with staggering amazement just how true a statement it was. He shook himself, swallowing once. "But…we _must _get the boy first. Children disappear from orphanages in this city every day, Anthony…and there's no knowing what will happen to us---to _any _of us---when we go to the House of Records. If we don't get Toby _now, _he may be taken or moved somewhere, and it will be nigh _impossible_ for us to ever find him again."

There was a moment of silence. They came to the street, and Sweeney looked around them quickly, making sure there was no one in sight.

"We'll go on foot from here," he muttered, checking once more over his shoulder. "We'll draw less attention." He then let the reins of the horse fall from his fingers, stepped back, and yelled once, briefly, as he slapped the animal's back. It startled fearfully, whinnying as it took off at a nervous trot down the city street, the sound of its clapping hooves audible even after it disappeared around the corner. Sweeney watched it until it was out of sight. _Be better off, anyhow….someone will find it and claim it for their own…_

"Mr. Todd," Anthony's voice suddenly appeared, quiet and hesitant. Sweeney turned and looked at his companion, a shade of the harshness fading from his face. Anthony looked up at him, and he narrowed his eyes gently for him to continue.

"I---I'm sorry if I've been…in_sensitive _to you, my friend_. _I'm just---I don't know what I'd do if I lost her. Johanna is my whole life, Mr. Todd."

Sweeney felt a sudden twinge deep in his chest, and quickly looked away. _My whole life…_

…_Nellie…_

"I've been so worried about her, I've…I've forgotten that you've lost your family, as well, Mr. Todd," Anthony apologized softly, his head down. "And not only Mrs. Lovett….but your boy, Toby."

The twinge pulled again, harder this time, and Sweeney slowly looked up.

_Toby…his boy…his…_

"I suppose I…just never realized, that Toby…that you…that he…what he _was _to you."

Sweeney stared, his throat suddenly hurting as if there was something he needed to say, but couldn't.

_What he…what Toby…truly was. _

_The word…the word he could not yet bring himself to say. He had a distinct feeling that he would be saying it…very soon._

Gently, almost shyly, he reached out and put his hand on Anthony's shoulder. The sailor lifted his head…for a single, wordless moment, they simply looked at each other. The silence of the city---which was indeed never truly silent at all, but rather cluttered with the subdued, distant noises of wheels and footsteps and horses and the ever-present hubbub of a million conversations at once---surrounded them, and inside of that moment, Sweeney was trying to say something, though he didn't quite know what it was. But then, as quickly as it had come, the moment passed, and the urgency of action returned. He let his hand fall from Anthony's shoulder, and his black eyes grew as hard and emotionless as two coal diamonds.

"Come, Anthony," he said, all at once seized by the sudden dread that they had already wasted far too much time. He turned and set his sights toward Charring...towards Toby.

"We haven't a moment to lose."

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

_Upside-down gaslights._

Nellie's eyes fluttered open a crack, and the moment they did a searing pain surged through them, the light burning her vision despite it's only dim half-glow. She closed her eyes again, groaning softly through closed lips.

_The lamps. Why were they upside down?_

The instant the thought crossed her mind, she was suddenly jolted by something, her entire body jumping and a tight spasm coursing like whiplash through her neck. She winced in pain, quickly lifting her head upright…it had been hanging backwards over something.

"I'm sorry, miss, I…I just s-s-stumbled a bit, I d-didn't mean to…" a voice, near to her face and kinked with a heavy stutter, trailed off apologetically. Curiosity won over discomfort, and she slowly opened her eyes a tiny fraction.

Her vision was blurry and the colors swam before her eyes, but after a few seconds of squinted she was able to make out the concerned face of a young, earnest-looking man, his hazel eyes looking worriedly down at her. The next moment she realized he was carrying her in his arms, forced to edge carefully sideways given the narrow constraints of the corridor. Nellie closed her eyes briefly and winced, her head throbbing painfully, but the rest of her body warped with a strange, stifling numbness. She felt next to nothing below the neck, but in struggling to lift her hand to rub at her splitting forehead she realized with mild astonishment that the manacles had at last been removed from her wrists.

"I do ap-p-pologize if I…jarred you, miss," the young man stuttered anxiously, gently adjusting his hold beneath her knees and back. He sounded _very _young indeed---perhaps no more than twenty or twenty-one. Nellie peered up at his face through bleary eyes, her mind blank and confused.

"S'alright. No 'arm done, dearie," she mumbled absently, groggily, as if she'd just awoken from a very long sleep. She gingerly touched her forehead with her fingers and started slightly when she felt a wet tackiness on her skin, along with an abrupt stinging sensation.

"Oh, you…you don't want to…do that, miss," the young man said quickly. He was a very nervous-sounding person. "You…ah…you don't want to…to g-get that infected, I mean."

Nellie turned and looked up at him, scrutinizing him, squinting her eyes. _What was going on? Who on earth was---?_

The next thing she knew, she was being carried carefully through an open doorway, the young man tilting her body and holding her close to his chest to avoid bumping her into the frame. The world turned slowly around her until she abruptly felt a firm, flat surface pressing beneath her, and the man's hands slid slowly out from under her. She at last opened her eyes fully, blinking in the warm light. She was lying on her back in the corner of a small, bare wooden room, on what felt like a very thin, very cheap mattress, the sort one might find in a more-humane-than-usual prison cell. She tilted her head to the side. Beside her was a small, shabby bedside table; on it sat a kerosene lamp, a bowl of water, a clean washcloth, and what appeared to be a small medical kit. She heard the sound of the door closing and footsteps quietly crossing the floor; then the face of the man was above her again, kneeling down beside her. Looking him over, she saw from his uniform that he was one of the constables. She groaned and wearily rolled her head to the side.

"Where am I?" she muttered tiredly, not completely certain she even cared to hear the answer. "Don' tell me you ruddy pigs still ain't through with your fun…."

To her utter surprise, the young police officer kneeling beside her suddenly uttered a low, guttural gasping sound and lifted his fist quickly to cover his mouth, his hazel eyes shining and his face wrought in an agonized look of pity. She turned her head back to look at him squarely, her eyes narrowed in shock and confusion.

"Who are you?" she whispered, her heart suddenly pounding. It was the first part of her body that the feeling had returned to…her arms and legs lay still on the cot, limp and unmoving like the limbs of a rag doll.

To her even greater shock, the constable slowly reached toward her and delicately pulled the loose strands of hair from her forehead, brushing it gently aside. Nellie simply stared at him speechlessly, her lips parted, her expression confounded and blank.

The constable's eyes were so bright it actually looked as if he were going to cry any moment.

"I'm sorry," he said quietly, his hand trembling slightly as he withdrew it. "I'm s-so, _s_-_so _sorry."

Nellie only blinked. "What are you goin' on about?" she whispered blankly. "Who in blazes _are _you?"

"My name is D-Daniel Northing, miss," he answered, his voice quivering. "I…I'm an officer of Scotland Yard, assigned to Beadle Connor's…t-task force."

"I can see that, love," Nellie joked feebly, a faint smile turning on her lips. She didn't know where she was, or what on earth had happened…she felt nothing but a strange, sapping kind of weariness and apathy, as if she didn't even care enough to try and remember. _The Beadle's whisper in her ear…the whirr of the typewriter…the roar of the sea…then, nothing, nothing but blackness…._

"Miss," the constable, Daniel Northing, said gently, his hand suddenly holding hers, as if in an attempt to calm her down. Nellie glanced at it almost amusedly. "Miss, I…I've been ordered to address the w-worst of your…your w-wounds."

Nellie looked back up at him. Her eyes narrowed thoughtfully.

"Wounds?" she parroted blankly.

Daniel wet his lips nervously, then nodded. "I…I…I think he…the Beadle, that is…I think he was f-frightened, a bit, by the…b-by the whole th-thing---that's why he's allowed me to…t-take care of you---didn't realize what would have h-happened, if…if he'd actually…."

Nellie blinked.

_Wounds? The Beadle, __**frightened?**__ What was he---?_

"Here…let me…help you," the young man said quietly, gently taking her by the shoulders and helping her rise into a sitting position. Her head swam dizzily for a moment, and she squeezed her eyes shut as Daniel leaned her back to rest her shoulders against the wall. She cracked her eyes open, blinking twice…then she looked down. Her eyes widened.

In a single moment, it all came back to her….not in a rush, not a sudden bombardment of memory; the images, the sounds…they simply reappeared in her mind, calmly and quietly. All at once she remembered everything. She let her eyelids lower, her gaze staring apathetically down at her body. She suddenly became aware that her mouth tasted like blood. She delicately touched her fingers to her lips…they were hard and crusted with it. She traced her fingers up her face, over her eye…everywhere, her skin was dried with the red stain. She touched the same spot on her forehead, and felt the same itching sting…she drew her hand away, and her fingertips were red.

"P-Please, don't, miss," Daniel pleaded, taking her by the wrist and coaxing it back down to her side. "You'll make the cuts worse."

Nellie barely heard him. As if she were moving through a dream, she let her eyes troll slowly over every visible inch of her body. Her dress was torn in four places, revealing long patches of bare white skin on her arms and legs. She was covered with bruises and scratches; everywhere she looked, there were mottled purple and yellow marks on her skin, sprays of dried blood, and tacky reddish-brown smears. Her left forearm looked as if it had been burned with the heads of matches; there were no less than four small round spots seared into the flesh, the skin white and blistered. She looked down at her legs. One of her stockings had nearly been shredded, and there was an impossibly huge bloodstain soaking through the right side of her skirt. She narrowed her eyes incredulously at it.

"Daniel," she said quietly. He looked up at her, and in the corner of her gaze she saw his eyes shining threateningly again. "Daniel. What is that?"

He drew a deep, shaking breath, then exhaled. With his face turned away from her, he slowly, ever so gently, took the hem of her skirt in his hands and rolled the material up past her knee. Nellie stared at the shin of her right leg in total silence. There, about five inches below the knee, was a gaping wound, crusted with red, blood draining from it even as she watched. It was a bullet-hole.

"I'm sorry," Daniel Northing was whispering. He might have finally been crying…she didn't turn to look. In fact, she didn't even hear him speak, because all at once she had been transported back to a moment…to _the _moment…approximately one hour earlier.

_She was on the floor. She remembered because there was a large scrape on her cheekbone, and it stung bitingly as it was rubbed into the wood dusty wood. Her face was streaked with tears, long-dried, and her mouth was open as she gasped continually for breath, her chest heaving rapidly._

_The Beadle had his sleeves rolled up. He had managed, somehow, to keep them clean…but his hands and forearms had been unavoidably smeared here and there with blood. Three constables stood around her….for the moment, they were still…but their sleeves had been rolled up, as well. No, wait…one of them was still wearing his blue coat. He stood back slightly further from the others, and there was an expression of nothing short of pure terror on his pale face._

Daniel Northing?

_The Beadle seemed to be slightly out of breath. She heard and felt as he dropped to his knees beside her, lowering his face until it was close to hers. She squeezed her eyes shut, not even fully registering the dozens of points of pain on her body. She had begun to go numb about fifteen minutes ago._

"_I'll admit it, Mrs. Lovett," the Beadle panted, wheezing slightly, the smile audible in his voice. "You were a tough nut to crack. I've known grown men who were screaming for their mothers after five minutes. You lasted nearly twice that long."_

_Nellie didn't answer. Her mouth was dry, her throat hoarse and burning…she didn't know how long she had screamed for or what kind of things she had said. She had been aware, at one point, of the Beadle yelling instructions to her…things for her to repeat. She remembered because after every sentence he dictated to her, he snapped a leather belt across her thighs._

"_Say it!"_

_THWACK!_

_She'd only screamed, her body contorting in agony as the stripes of the belt seared across her skin like fire._

"_I said SAY IT!"_

_THWACK!_

_The last in a series of tears rolled down her cheeks…after that, it was as if her wells had finally run dry and she could do nothing but shriek._

"_SAY IT! I, ELEANOR LOVETT! SAY IT!"_

_THWACK! THWACK!_

_Nellie trembled and jerked, doubling over on the chair until her forehead touched her knees._

"_SAY IT, or so help me __**God**__…"_

_THWACK! That time, the belt snapped across her back, and it was that that had sent her sprawling onto the floor. She rolled to her side, and amongst the garbled sobbing and gasping for breath, she somehow choked out the words._

"_I…E-Eleanor…L-L-Lovett…"_

"…_confess that I did, knowingly and willfully….SAY IT!"_

_THWACK!_

_Her memory fazed out after that. She didn't know how much of the forced confession she had parroted back to him…she only knew that, for the moment at least, the fray of blows seemed to have come to a halt. The Beadle knelt beside her, and her guard for the day, as well as the two additional constables he had called in some time ago, stood their ground silently. _

"_But not to worry, my dear, not to worry," the Beadle whispered excitedly between panting breaths. "We've but one step left to go." He suddenly jerked his head up and motioned to one of the constables. "You, Northing…get to her to the table." _

_There was a silent pause._

"_NOW!" the Beadle roared. There was an anxious scuffling of feet, but Nellie kept her eyes squeezed shut and saw nothing. She coughed and gasped as she was lifted from the floor and hoisted once more up into the chair. She hunched over, her bounds hands hanging behind her, pulling her arms uncomfortably taut. She was too preoccupied with the dulled, all-consuming pain to give more than a passing thought to how oddly gentle the hands that had picked her up had been. _

Northing. Daniel Northing. Yes, she remembered him now. The youngest of the three officers…he was the only one who hadn't laid so much as a hand on her…

"_Yes…the final touch, Mrs. Lovett," the Beadle sneered, and she heard the sound of brisk footsteps, the sharp snap of a piece of paper being pulled from the typewriter, and the soft shuffle as something was pushed toward her on the table. Weakly, dizzily, just moments from blacking out…she opened her eyes, her chest heaving with breath. Blood was trickling into her left eye, stinging sharply, and she immediately shut it again, but she continued to stare down, only half-conscious, at the sheet of paper in front of her._

_The Beadle was standing behind her, bending over her shoulders. His hand---smeared with her blood---appeared, and placed an ink pen on the table in front of her. There was a short, almost delicate __**chink**__…and suddenly her manacles slipped away, her arms falling forward, the muscles aching from behind locked in the unnatural position for so long. She trembled as she lifted her hands into her lap and fisted them in her tattered skirt. _

"_One last step, and then we're through," the Beadle muttered in her ear, his breath hot and wet on her skin. She stared down at the paper as lifelessly as a statue. "All you need to do now is sign your name on the bottom line. Just one little signature---Eleanor Lovett, in black and white---and it can all be over."_

_A silence as heavy as death filled the room, but the Beadle's voice seemed to linger, like smoke, in her ears. She squinted through her one eye down at the confession. The Beadle was moving, circling around her like a jackal. He moved to stand at her right side, bent over with his hands resting on the table and his leering face hovering over her. Slowly, painfully…she turned to look at him. He smiled._

"_Two little words, my dear. Eleanor. Lovett. A tedious thing, I know…believe me, it was ever so much easier back in the good old days when a man of the law was taken at his word, no questions asked…but unfortunately, they've since decided they'd like the criminal's own signature on his confession. So, if you please, Mrs. Lovett…the pen. Two little words, and we can be finished with this nasty business once and for all."_

_Nellie said nothing. She stared at him blankly through her one eye. Bruised. Bleeding. Silent._

_The Beadle narrowed his eyes. "I am trying to do this in a gentlemanly manner, Mrs. Lovett," he growled. "That does not __**have **__to be the case."_

_He picked up the pen, seized her wrist, and pushed it into her palm._

_Nellie looked down at the pen in her hand. She turned it slowly in her trembling fingers, gazing down the golden point. Her heart pounded in her ears. The pain throbbed, pulsing, half-numb, all around her. She looked up again into the Beadle's face._

"_Even you know how to write your own name, Mrs. Lovett," he muttered darkly. "Let's have the signature…or are you in need of still further __**persuasion?" **__he threatened, moving his hand to his belt._

_Nellie swallowed. Her throat was dry and sore. Her vision was getting blurrier by the moment. Her fingers curled shut around the pen as she stared straight into Beadle Connor's eyes, and she forced herself to drawn on whatever swiftly failing reserves of strength she had left and rasped out just two words. _

"_Fuck…you."_

_She'd aimed for his eye. She missed and only got him in the corner of his mouth._

_The Beadle screamed in shock and pain as he reeled backward, stumbling and falling to the floor with a deafening crash. Immediately, the two officers nearest to him were at his side._

"_Sir! Sir, are you alright?? Beadle Connor sir!!"_

"_GET OFF ME!" he shrieked sitting bolt upright so quickly he nearly pegged one of the bent over officers in the face. He covered his mouth with one hand as blood trickled down his chin. _

_Nellie's final burst of energy had sent her falling sideways off of the chair, and she lay there on her side, collapsed on the floor once again. She feebly held up the hand that was still clutched in a death grip around her makeshift weapon and peered weakly at it through her one open eye. In spite of everything, she smiled. It hurt her mouth to smile, but she couldn't help it. A small, bloody chunk of blonde whiskers from Beadle Connor's mustache was stuck in the sharp brass tip of the pen._

"_LET GO OF ME!" the Beadle's voice raged like thunder in the small room as he shoved aside the two constables. It hardly seemed possible, but his voice had reached a pitch of more terrible fury than Nellie had ever heard it._

_She became vaguely aware that the third police officer, the one with the gentle hands, was kneeling in front of her, desperately trying to get her to stand up._

"_Please," he was whispering frantically, carefully struggling to get her hands beneath her arms. "P-Please, get up, before he---"_

"_OUT OF MY WAY!"_

_The officer whirled his head around a split second before Beadle Connor seized him by the shoulder and veritably threw him aside. As he did, he reached down and seized the revolver from the constable's belt, whipping it into the air in one fluid motion._

"_NO! Sir, please, CALM DOWN!!"_

"_I SAID __**OUT OF MY WAY! **__I'LL FUCKING KILL THE BITCH!!!"_

_Nellie heard everything that was happening as if she were underwater…the sound was dull, muffled, and far away. Her fingers relaxed from the shaft of the pen, and it rolled away from her as her hand hit the floor. She let her open eye close slowly and the tension drained from her whole body. She thought nothing. She cared about nothing. She just wanted to sleep so the aching would stop._

_Now all three of the constables were on their feet, pulling at the Beadle's arm that held the gun and struggling to reason with him._

"_Sir, please!!"_

"_NO! I'LL __**KILL HER!"**_

_There was a sound like meat packing against a stone floor as Beadle Connor elbowed two of the constables in the face simultaneously. His right arm shot forward in an arrow straight line, the nose of the pistol pointed squarely at Nellie. She heard the gentle metallic click of the gun cocking. She opened her eyes halfway._

"_NO!"_

_**PAAAAUUUCCCHHH!**_

_The last thing she saw was Northing, the young constable, pushing the Beadle's arm aside and the two of them sprawling onto the table. Then the bullet dug into her shin, and for a split second the world stopped and there was nothing, nothing but an explosion of the most intense, white-hot pain she had ever felt. Her scream was cut short as she fainted._

Nellie opened her eyes with a gasping inhalation of breath so sharp she immediately burst into a coughing fit. Daniel's hands were on her shoulders in the blink of an eye.

"Miss! Miss, are you alright?"

_No._

All at once her numbness evaporated; the instant the sound of the bullet firing from the gun echoed a second time through her memory, her body had jolted back to life and the pain was excruciating. For a full minute she simply gasped, over and over again, her chest jumping back and forth and her whole body jerking as if she were going to seize. Daniel threw his weight against her, struggling to keep her still on the bed.

"Miss! Miss!! _Mrs. Lovett!!" _he cried desperately as she tossed and fought against him, emitting shrill, ragged cries of agony. Her fingers wrenched in the air, her arms outstretched as her hands reached desperately for her right leg as if trying to tear it clean from her body. Fresh tears welled in her eyes and trickled from the corners.

"Mrs. _Lovett!" _Daniel Northing shouted, pushing all of his strength against her and forcing her torso back against the wall. For a long moment---a _long _moment---he held her pinned there, holding her firmly in his arms with his head over her shoulder, as her chest heaved wildly and breath rushed in and out between her parted lips.

Finally, when she had again become perfectly still, Daniel slowly, cautiously, eased back. When he looked into her face, her eyes were staring blankly forward, and she was crying softly.

Daniel Northing's face was pale and frightened. He swallowed repeatedly, his hands trembling.

"Just…just hold on, M-Mrs. Lovett," he pleaded anxiously, turning quickly and fumbling with the medical kit. He snapped the metal lid open and clattered noisily through its contents. Nellie didn't even look at him. She stared off into nothingness, the tears rolling from her eyes and clearing clean lines through the dry blood on her face.

Daniel straightened up again and looked at her. In his hands were a small glass syringe and a swab of cotton soaked in amber rubbing alcohol.

"Mrs. Lovett," he said gently. "I n-need you to be still. I'm going to give you something that will help take…t-take the pain away."

Nellie didn't acknowledge that she had heard him. He wet his lips over and over, struggling to steady his shaking hands as he gently turned her arm over and cleaned a patch of skin above the vein. She barely felt it as the needle slid smoothly through her skin and injected the clear drug. Daniel waited until the cylinder was empty, then quickly withdrew the syringe and pressed the cotton back over the pinprick. For the next several minutes, the young constable was busied with hastily dressing the bullet wound in her leg, which was by far the most severe of her injuries. Daniel began to talk nervously as he worked.

"In a way, you're…you're very l-lucky, M-Miss. The bullet…it…it entered head-on at the f-far outer part of the limb---missed…m-missed the bone, thank God---and p-pushed clean through, out the other side. P-perfect exit wound."

Nellie didn't so much as bat an eyelid in the young man's direction as he carefully cleaned the fleshy hole with burning alcohol, then padded it full of cotton and wound her entire leg in what seemed to be miles of white bandages. When he had finally finished, Daniel closed his eyes and gave a long, weary exhale. He had just turned to place the bandage roll and blood-stained rags back on the table when Nellie suddenly jerked toward him, loose strands of hair falling over her wide, desperate eyes. Northing jumped, startled, dropping the bandages on the floor.

"M-Mrs. Lovett?"

Tears streamed from her eyes. She leaned close to him, reaching out and grabbing the front of his clothes in her fist. He stared at her, shocked and speechless.

"_What if 'e's right??" _Nellie whispered frantically. It didn't matter that there was a fresh, ragged hole in her leg. It didn't matter that she couldn't feel her left arm and that there were more bruises spotting her body than she could count. It didn't matter that she hadn't known this young Daniel Northing until a few short minutes ago. Everything seemed to melt superfluously away, leaving nothing but her one, desperate fear. She looked straight into Northing's frightened eyes, pleading with him, as if he had an answer to give her.

Daniel blinked, placing a sturdy hand over Nellie's trembling wrist. "What if who's right?" he asked gently, his stutter gone for the moment.

Nellie gasped and cried fervently, grabbing hold of him with her other hand as well. "The Beadle," she cried, pulling him even closer. "The Beadle, 'e said…'e said…_what if 'e's right?? What if Mr. Todd comes for me??"_

"Shhh," Daniel whispered, prying her fingers loose and forcing her hands into lap. "Try to calm down, Mrs. Lovett…"

"_No!" _she sobbed hysterically, her whole body trembling._ "_What if 'e comes 'ere? What if 'e really does try to save me?? What'll I do if 'e gets 'imself killed, Daniel? _What the 'ell am I supposed to do if 'e goes and gets 'imself killed, the great, stupid---??"_

"_Mrs. Lovett!" _Daniel hissed, leaning forward suddenly and lifting his hand to her face, cupping her cheek and simultaneously putting his thumb over her lips. She silenced immediately, but her shoulders continued to shake as she was racked with continual sobs. Slowly, glancing once nervously in the direction of the door, he withdrew his hand.

"_Please, _Mrs. Lovett, you _must _try to k-k-keep quiet!" he whispered urgently. Nellie shook her head slowly, the tears rolling down her cheeks as she looked into his face.

No…it didn't matter that she hadn't known this young Daniel Northing until only a few short minutes ago. Without a word of warning, Nellie let herself fall forward into him. Daniel started slightly, immediately catching her in his arms. She let her head fall over his shoulder as he held her, shaking slightly, clearly unsure what else to do. She didn't care. She was so tired…_just so bloody tired. _And she felt as if she'd been alone for half a lifetime, even though it had scarcely been one full day. She just needed _someone._

"M-m-miss?" Daniel stuttered quietly beside her.

Her tears soaked silently into the fabric of his collar.

"I'm tired, Daniel," she whispered. "I'm so tired. I don't know what I'll do if…if Mr. Todd…"

She trailed off, unable to finish the thought. Slowly, gradually, Daniel relaxed, holding her gently but firmly in his arms. For a moment, they just stayed there in total silence.

"Mrs. Lovett," he finally spoke. She didn't answer him. "Mrs. Lovett, I…I don't know who you are. I don't…I don't know what you've done, or if you're g-guilty, or…or innocent." He swallowed, so thickly she could hear it through his neck. She squeezed her eyes shut and buried her face in his shoulder. She thought she felt his arms tighten around her just the littlest bit.

"But there's one thing I do know," he whispered, and his voice had suddenly changed, somehow. "I know that this is wrong. From the very beginning, I…I think…I knew that _he…_the B-Beadle…that he was wrong. But this…what he did, t-tonight…now I'm s-sure of it."

Silent tears rolled from her eyes. Nellie had thanked heaven for a good deal of things in her life---probably enough things, in fact, that the words had long since ceased to hold any real meaning for her. But she believed, at that moment, that as she silently thanked God for this man, for this stranger, Daniel Northing, that she truly meant it, with all the sincerity she had left inside of her.

"I'm going to h-h-help you, Mrs. Lovett," Daniel said quietly in her ear. "I d-don't know how. But…I promise you…I'm g-going to _help."_

Nellie closed her eyes and simply cried. She let herself cry for a long time.

She didn't know how long it had been, how long Daniel had been holding her like that, when she finally opened her eyes and slowly leaned back away from him.

"Daniel," she whispered, her face streaked with tears and blood. "I'm so tired."

Daniel Northing slowly rose to his feet, standing over her, his young face made even younger and more frightened-looking in his attempts to be brave.

"Sleep," he said softly. "I'll s-s-stay…I'll s-stay here."

She wanted---so badly---to smile for him. But she couldn't. He helped her---_his hands, so quiet, so gentle_---he helped her to slide further down on the cot, until her head rested on the threadbare mattress. The moment she was laying down, her eyelids fluttered, complete and utter exhaustion flooding through her ravaged body.

_What if he's right? What if he's right…what will I do?_

_What will I do…if I lose him…_

A warm weight suddenly settled down over her…she cracked one eye and saw Daniel straightening up, looking down at her for just a moment, then turning nervously away. The long, heavy blue coat of his uniform lay draped over her, covering her down to her ankles. She gingerly curled up on her side, tucking her feet beneath the warmth of the coat. Within seconds, she was asleep.

_I couldn't…I couldn't bear it. I'd rather die here alone, than…._

…_.please…..please, Sweeney….please….just stay away._

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

They had been walking as swiftly as their legs could carry them---indeed, it was truthfully closer to running than walking---without drawing undue attention from the few wandering evening pedestrians and carriages they passed, for nearly the better part of an hour; but all at once, without even glancing at each other, Sweeney and Anthony came to a simultaneous halt at the small, shabby front entrance to the building. His breath rattling slightly, Sweeney trolled his gaze up the peeling, unwelcoming set of doors to the greening copper sign set above them into the brick.

_Brother St. Peter, Orphanage of the Holy Family. _Without any provocation, Sweeney felt a sudden stirring of anger deep inside his chest.

_Holy Family indeed…the closest thing to a family any of the children in this place had ever known were the colonies of lice living in their beds._

Sweeney started minutely, because that thought had brought a rather unexpected memory to his mind…or, rather, to his chest, because it was in that area that he suddenly felt the warm, close fluttering, as if from a second heartbeat…the heartbeat of a small body held against his, in the dark, in a hayloft…

"_I never 'ad a dad before."_

"Well…here we are, my friend."

Sweeney blinked and turned sharply to Anthony, quickly suffocating the memory down before it could rise up and overwhelm him.

"Stay here, Anthony," he ordered shortly, ignored the immediate look of protestation on the sailor's face.

"But Mr---"

"_Stay, here," _Sweeney gritted through his teeth, silencing him. "It will be easier if I go alone. Stay here, and wait for us."

Anthony looked as if he wanted to argue, but thought better of it and closed his mouth. He narrowed his eyes and nodded firmly. Sweeney held his gaze for a second longer, then turned and went up the crumbling stoop to the front doors of the orphanage. With every step, he felt his heart pounding harder, and it both angered and perplexed him. _Why was he so nervous?_

_I know, _Benjamin Barker muttered quietly in his head. Sweeney deliberately ignored him, swallowing thickly and stepping up to the lamp-lit wooden door. He tried it, knowing fully well it would be locked anyway. He lifted the heavy black knocker and banged it three times, _loudly._

He looked over his shoulder, narrowing his eyes and Anthony and motioning for him to leave. Anthony started, then obediently hurried away to stand inconspicuously at the street corner, his hands held calmly in front of him as if he were waiting for a cab.

Sweeney pounded the knocker again, five times instead of three. For a long moment, nothing happened. He felt a nervous pulse jolting through his leg, and was astonished to glance down and discover that his right foot was tapping incessantly. He clenched his jaw, wringing his hands once and forcing himself to be still.

_I know why…it's the word, Todd. Never thought you'd have to say it, did you? Never thought you'd be one of __**those **__again…_

He only set his jaw harder, refusing to dignify Barker with so much as a mental response.

He had just lifted his hand to pound the knocker a third time when there was a sudden clanking of ancient locks. He jumped slightly, quickly withdrawing his hand and stepping back. The thick, heavy door creaked open just a crack, and the bitter, wrinkled scowl of a woman in her 60s peered out. Her pale, biting eyes narrowed irately when she saw Sweeney standing there.

"An' jus' what in thieving blazes do you want, eh?" she demanded sharply. "Ain't you got any wits, mister? It's nearly---"

"I apologize if I've…disturbed you, madam," Sweeney interrupted gently, forcing his voice into a calm, polite tone, with just the faintest undercurrents of desperation. The woman squinted her eyes, straightening up and fully opening the door. She was dressed in a sleeping-bonnet and several heavy layers of nightgown, along with a shawl that she clutched shut in front of her, the ends of it so long they trailed on the floor.

"You're bloody right, you've _disturbed _me," she muttered venomously. "Do you know what bloody time it is? Orphanage closes up at eight o'clock, mister, and it ain't even a visitin' day besides! Now for the last time, _what _in na' bloody 'ell do you want??"

Sweeney swallowed thickly, and as he opened his mouth to answer, the words suddenly got stuck in his throat. He stood there for a few seconds, his jaw hovering soundlessly, his eyes starting to ache out of nowhere.

The old woman scowled bitterly. "Spit it out, you filthy beggar!"

He swallowed a second time. _The word. Say it. Just say it!_

He stared her straight in the eye and swallowed a third time, quietly clearing his throat. _Just one little word…why couldn't he bring himself to say it?_

"I've…I've come for my…boy," he said, his voice nearly cracking. _Say it, just __**say it**__…why couldn't he say it??_

The woman threw up her hands in disgust. "That's what you pull me out of a warm bed for in the middle o' the blinkin' night?? We ain't goin' to run outta orphans, mister, we're overrun with the stinkin' little vermin! Come back in the mornin'…or better yet, come back on visitin' day! The next one's the first Tuesday o' the month. Good_night, _sir!"

She stepped back, grabbing the door to slam it shut…Sweeney stuck his foot forward into the doorway the split second before it closed in his face, jamming it open. He seized the edge of the door and pushed it in, storming inside to stand on the threshold. The woman's bitter glare instantly changed to an expression of fear as she backed away, her wrinkled lips trembling.

"Now….now see 'ere, you…" she sputtered, her pale eyes wide. "You…you jus' keep away from me…you lay a single 'and on me, an' I'll call for Scotland Yard, I will…"

"You misunderstood me," Sweeney said deeply, calmly. The woman paused, blinking repeatedly, pulling the shawl tighter around her shoulders as if to protect herself. Sweeney took another step into the dimly lit foyer, pushing the door shut behind him.

"I didn't come here for _a _boy," he said, staring the woman straight in the eye. "I came for _my _boy."

The woman's fearful gaze dropped, and she leaned forward slightly, squinting at him almost curiously.

"Your….your _boy---_?"

Sweeney closed his eyes. He took a long, deep breath, then let it out slowly. He opened his eyes and looked up at her, and all of a sudden, his pounding heart had become perfectly still. Somewhere, far away, deep inside of him…it was as if a fist that had been clenched in a death grip around a small part of him for sixteen years, suddenly let go. Something broke loose, something that allowed him to say it…and when he did, it rang like an echo inside of him, and it started his heart beating again…and he felt the same curious warmth spreading through him that he had felt that night in the hayloft.

"My son. I've come for my son."

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

The lamps had all been extinguished nearly an hour ago, but Toby hadn't so much as come close to falling asleep. From the incessant sounds of whispering and giggling and rustling sheets all around him, it was clear that many of the other children were still awake, too.

"_Psssst. _'Ey, you, new bugger. _'Ey," _a voice hissed somewhere in the dark beside him.

For a moment, Toby ignored it. He lay quietly on his side, his arms folded inside his jacket against the cold. Hidden next to his heart, his fingers closed secretly around his treasures. They sat snugly, quietly, in the inside pocket, warmed from the heat of his body. He closed his eyes, refusing to let himself cry. Crying would do him no good, here…he had learned that a long time ago.

"'_Ey! _New bugger! I'm talkin' to _you!"_

Toby sighed, rolling over to face the owner of the voice. It was Bill, the grinning, scruffy little seven-year-old who occupied the bed next to him. With the dim light of the streetlamps outside glowing through the single window at the end of the long room, he could just barely make out Bill's face, his two missing front teeth marking a black, gaping hole in his broad smile. Toby had been in this place scarcely a full day, and already Bill seemed to have latched onto him like a leech.

"What?" Toby whispered blankly, truly not caring what the little pest had to say.

Bill reached beneath his covers and pulled out a small chunk of something pale and crumbly.

"I nipped George's biscuit at dinner when 'e weren't lookin'," he grinned proudly, holding the mealy handful out for Toby to see. "You want a bit? Eh?"

Toby closed his eyes and sighed again. As much as his small stomach ached and complained for want of food ( the meals at this orphanage were very much the same as they had been at his old workhouse; cold, watery, and of portions slightly too small to satisfy your common housecat ), the last thing he felt like doing at the moment was eating.

"No thanks," he muttered tonelessly, turning back to his other side and staring listlessly into the darkness. "You eat it."

"You _sure?" _the little boy mumbled, already stuffing half the biscuit into his gap-toothed mouth.

Toby didn't answer. There was an acid stinging behind his eyes, and he sniffed once as tears began to well up in the corners.

_Don't cry, you great baby, _he ordered himself fiercely as the first of the tears rolled sideways down his face and soaked into his mite-infested pillow.

_Crying won't bring them back…_

He slipped his hand again inside his jacket---every child in the place slept with all their clothes on, and even then the bleak chill in the room was enough to set them shivering---and closed his fingers around the hidden treasure next to his heart. It didn't matter if they found out what he was hiding; he wouldn't give it to them. He didn't care what they tried to do to him…he would never let them take them from him. _Never._

Toby closed his eyes and began to cry softly, his small noises all but lost among the loud whispering and occasional snickering laughter of the other boys. If anyone heard him, they ignored him.

_Mrs. Lovett…Mr. Todd…._

_Mum…._

_Where was she? What was the Beadle doing to her?_

_He saw her defeated face, her downcast eyes…heard her desperate scream as he had charged at the constables, blinded by rage…saw his own hand, reaching out for her as he was thrown into the carriage…and that was the last he had seen of her._

"Mum," he whispered softly, fisting his hand in his threadbare sheet, more tears running from his eyes as he sniffled. "Mum…please be alright…please, come find me…"

""Ey!" Bill's high-pitched voice suddenly piped up in a loud, frantic whisper. "'Ey…everybody, shut up, quick! Listen!"

The enormous room full of boys immediately fell silent, and Toby lifted his head up from the pillow, his ears straining to listen. He heard it…footsteps on the stairs, the jangling of a ring of keys, and the hushed, raspy voice of Mrs. Mapleton, the head matron, rattling just outside the door.

"Everybody sleep!" someone hissed loudly, and there was a muffled thumping as more than thirty little heads and bodies simultaneously flopped down limp on their mattresses. Toby quickly followed suit, smearing a hand over his tear-streaked face and falling down silent on his pillow, his eyes closed and his hand squeezed tightly around his treasures, his heart thumping wildly beside them. Mrs. Mapleton's voice grew louder as the keys fumbled in the lock.

"…really don' know why you couldn' wait 'til mornin,'" she was grumbling. "S'your own miserable fault if you can't keep an eye on your own precious little urchin, not mine. Ain't nothin' goin' to 'appen 'im, besides…don' know nobody else who'd want any o' these scrawny things. Well…in you go, then. If 'e's 'ere at all, then 'e's in there."

There was a pause.

"Well? 'Urry it up!" the old woman snapped. "The sooner you find the little brute, the sooner you can leave, an' let me 'ave _'alf_ a night's sleep, at least."

Toby kept his eyes closed and his breath even. It was more than once in his orphaned life that he'd been soundly punished for being found awake after lights-out.

The door to the room creaked loudly open, the sound echoing in the silence. He heard the small sound of the gas being turned up, and the several lamps in the room brightened into life. The light glowed red through his eyelids. _Sleep, _he told himself. _You're asleep. _

"What are you waitin' for?" Mrs. Mapleton snapped crossly. "You see them there, now go an' find 'im already! I ain't got all night."

The sound of heavy, booted footsteps slowly crossed the floor, the wooden boards creaking. Toby squeezed his eyes shut tighter, willing himself to be perfectly still; even so, he couldn't help but wonder curiously what was going on. It was seldom indeed---in fact, he couldn't remember it ever happening in all his years of workhouse life---that someone came looking for an orphan in the nighttime. The footsteps continued on. Toby's bed was nearly at the end of the long room, and the gentle footfalls still sounded far away.

Then…it came. Just one small word…one quiet whisper from the far end of the room.

"Toby?"

His eyes had never shot open so quickly in his life.

Jerking so quickly he practically gave him whiplash, Toby spun around, shooting bolt upright in the bed, his breath rushing frantically in and out of his lungs, his heart hammering so wildly it felt as if it would burst from his chest. He stared, eyes wide, his mouth hovering open. He didn't even stop to think how it was possible---to wonder if it was even real, or if he was dreaming. Quicker than a flash of lightning, Toby was on his feet, standing up on the bed, the mattress creaking beneath him as he bobbed slightly up and down. All the other children dropped their pretense of sleep, sitting up and watching him, whispering curiously amongst themselves. Toby didn't so much as hear them.

For a moment that felt like an eternity, he simply stared across the room at him…at the vested back of tall, lean, menacing figure, the wild mane of dark hair with its lightning white streak, the pale face turned away from him as he slowly walked up and down, scanning the beds. Toby couldn't make himself speak. He just stood there and stared at Mr. Todd's back. His heart leapt into his mouth when he heard it again.

"Toby?"

And then, Toby heard something that he had never heard before…something that deep in his mind, he had never truly believed he would ever hear. Something he had given up hope on a long, long time ago.

"_Son?"_

It was only one word, but when he heard the small whisper of Mr. Todd's voice, forming that one word…something happened.

The floodgates burst, and tears erupted from Toby's eyes like two clear streams running down his face. Not even trying to contain his fervent sobbing, he opened his mouth and shouted, so loudly and clearly that every other whispering voice fell instantly silent.

"DAD!"

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

Sweeney stopped dead in his tracks. He stood straight up, his heart suddenly pounding in his ears like a drum.

Slowly, he turned around.

He had scarcely so much as caught a glimpse of Toby standing up on the bed before the boy had leapt down, nearly stumbling in his stocking feet, and taken off at a dead sprint down the narrow aisle between the two rows of beds, his footsteps thundering on the wooden floor like a team of horses. Sweeney stood straight up, watching as Toby ran toward him like a bolt of lightning. For a fraction of a second, everything---everything in the whole world, even his heartbeat---was completely silent.

Then---Toby plowed into him like a charging bull.

The boy dove at him so hard, Sweeney felt the air suck out of his stomach almost as if he'd been punched. He hunched, groaned slightly, and stumbled three steps dangerously backward, nearly knocked flat on his back by the sheer force of the impact. He teetered for a moment longer, then at last regained his footing, coughing a few times and blinking. He tried to inhale and discovered that he couldn't. He looked down.

Toby's was just tall enough that the top of his raggedy head didn't quite pass Sweeney's collarbone. His face was buried so deep in Sweeney's chest that it was completely hidden from view, and the boy's arms were wrapped so tightly around him he could scarcely breathe. They stood there, Toby locked around his torso like a vice, and a for a moment, Sweeney had no idea what to do. Every orphan in the room had abandoned their pretend sleeping and was sitting upright in their beds, watching in wide-eyed fascination; and for once, Mrs. Mapleton, the old matron who had shown him in, had nothing to say.

Sweeney stared down at the top of Toby's head, eyes narrowed, blinking. His arms hovered at his sides, twitching to move, but for some reason uncertain of how to do it. Then, he felt something, a small, heaving jerk back and forth---as he realized what it was, his startled expression immediately melted into such a look of softness that had he seen his own face in a mirror at that moment, he would never have recognized himself. _Toby. _Toby was crying, and trembling so hard that he shook Sweeney as well.

Somewhere inside him, the next in a series of invisible walls crumbled away, and the fluttering warmth---the warmth of fatherhood, a warmth of compassion he had not felt in sixteen years---flooded through him. Slowly, gingerly, he put his arms around Toby; and within seconds, realized that he was hugging the boy into him, if possible, even tighter than Toby was.

"Shhh," he whispered quietly, putting his hand on the back of Toby's head and holding it close to him. He lowered his face until the bridge of his nose rested in the crown of soft, scruffy hair. "It's alright. Nothing's going to harm you…not anymore_. _It's alright, son."

_It's alright…_

_Toby. His son._

_The __**word.**_

_It had finally happened…there was nothing left for him to hide from, nothing left for him to hold back. He had said it. He had accepted it. _

_Sweeney Todd had become a father again. And Toby…Toby…the nuisance, the pest, the liability…Toby was his child._

_His son._

"Shhhh, Toby," he whispered, holding him tighter as he shook silently. "There, now. It's alright."

Toby said nothing. He only cried harder.

For what felt like a long, long moment, they stood there together, unmoving.

When Mrs. Mapleton finally spoke, her haggard voice was like a stone shattering a pane of stained glass.

"Alright, alright, so you've found your ruddy' _boy_, then," she snapped, shuffling into the room. "Now take 'im an' get the bloody 'ell out of 'ere!"

Sweeney stayed where he was for a moment longer, his eyes closed in the warmth radiating out of the top of Toby's head. He had forgotten how warm they were, children. He had forgotten the way they smelled---the comforting, earthy smell of youth, the smell that was somehow always fresh and clean, even when they were dirty. He held Toby tightly, feeling that same small pulse of the boy's heartbeat transferring into his body.

"Come _on, _then!" Mrs. Mapleton snarled impatiently. "You deaf as well as stupid? I said let's _move it along! _What, you want I should gift-wrap the little tick for you, too? _Out, I said!"_

Sweeney lifted his head and opened his eyes. He put his hand on the back of Toby's neck.

"Come on, son," he whispered gently, and the boy sniffed loudly against his chest. "I'm taking you out of here."

Slowly, almost reluctantly, Toby let himself be eased away from his death-grip hug, sniffling and smearing his hand across his face. Sweeney put his hands firmly on the boy's shoulders, holding him close at his side. Together, they walked down the long room and through the door, and together they followed the dark stairs and corridors until they had at last stepped outside onto the stone threshold, and the heavy doors were shut behind them.

A/N; Awww! ( girly squeal ). I have to say, I think the Toby and Sweeney scenes of this fic might be my favorite to write. They give opportunities for adorable father-son fluff in an otherwise very bleak and violent story. ^_^ Oh, and fun fact; I looked it up, and the earliest use of morphine as a pain-killer was in the 1850s. Since that's the timeframe I pushed this story up to, I'm gonna go ahead and say it's adequately historically accurate ( beats off the fingers of anachronism with a spatula ). Anyway---hoped you liked the chapter! I had a lot of fun writing this one. Reviews make me smile!


	28. Chapter 28

_A/N; Helloooo, everyone! Ok, so I have good news, and I have bad news. The good news is that I think we're finally coming into the home stretch of this fic---there are several more chapters to go, of course, but the finish line is definitely in sight! The bad news is that I'm back at school now, and unfortunately my updates are probably going to become a bit farther and fewer in between. But I'll do my best to keep up and not sink into any more of those month-long hiatuses, at least. Sorry this chapter is shorter than usual…I just felt like this was a good place to end it._

_Disclaimer; I don't own Sweeney Todd. You don't own Sweeney Todd. And at the moment I can't think of anything clever to make us feel better about it. _

_Chapter 28_

_See How They Glisten_

or

_The Walls that Hide You_

Nellie blearily opened her eyes, immediately squinting in the sharp light of a candle on the nightstand close beside her heard. Something cold and wet was touching her skin. She blinked, groaning softly. Her head was swimming…everything was hot, hazy, and acrid, as if she were swaying on her feet in a room filled with chemical vapors. She could just barely make out the blurry shape and color of a face, hovering over her. The face looked down at her as a hand holding a washcloth continually daubed cold water over her cheeks and forehead, slowly coaxing the dried mixture of blood and tears away from her skin.

"Mmmm," she moaned, rolling partly onto her back. "What…what's the idea, love?" she mumbled irately as more cold drops of water rolled down her temples.

"Oh! You…y-you're awake," the face above stuttered quietly in surprise.

Nellie's head was throbbing, the pain centered like a hot coal at the crown of her skull. She moaned, squeezing her eyes shut and wrestling her hand free of whatever heavy sort of blanket was over her to press her palm to her damp forehead.

_That didn't just feel like water…it was thinner, more like sweat…and yet the air against her skin seemed freezing cold…_

"P-p-please, Mrs. Lovett…please, try to get as m-much s-sleep as you can. You're burning up with fever…"

The words sounded dull and muted, like someone was saying them with a pillow in their mouth. She squinted her eyes open again. Her vision had cleared a bit, but out of nowhere an intense heat had begun to burn like mad just behind her eyes. Even as the lay there, she felt delicate beads of sweat forming on her temples and the back of her neck.

"Mmm…alright, love," she mumbled deliriously, the words stumbling thoughtlessly out of her mouth with no direction. "…jus'…jus' make sure you wake me before mornin,' darlin'…got to get an early start tomorrow…'aven't got any dough rolled out at all, don' know 'ow I'm goin' to make it through the noon rush…"

The young man swallowed nervously. "I'll…I'll do that. But p-please…please, Mrs Lovett….t-try to sleep, at least a bit longer."

Nellie closed her eyes and rolled back onto her side, tucking herself into a ball, wincing against the sharp, pulsing ache in her head, and the strange, shooting pain that coursed through her right leg and ran in a circuit through her whole body. She had the distinct feeling she knew who that boy was…or at least that she _ought _to know who he was…but her mind was too hot and fuzzy, and her thoughts too scrambled to remember anything for certain. In the moment before she drifted back off to a fitful sleep, she wondered, just fleetingly, where Mr. Todd and Toby were at that moment, and if perhaps either of them knew who the stuttering young man was….

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

Sweeney, Anthony, and Toby had been very careful to walk calmly and deliberately until they reached the end of the block. They nodded congenially to a constable who was strolling by, headed in the other direction. Despite the anxious, distinctly swifter-than-normal beating of his heart, Sweeney managed to smile politely ( his hand still firm on Toby's shoulder ), and offered him a perfectly gentlemanly, "Good evening, officer." The constable only lifted his hand disinterestedly in recognition, and they calmly passed each other.

The second they had turned off of the main street into a narrow, winding alleyway; the moment they were hidden from the glow of the streetlamps, they set off at a run, their voiceless footsteps slapping the cobblestones and splashing in dirty puddles. They ran not _quite_ at full speed ( Sweeney continually kept checking behind him to make sure that Toby was able to keep up ) for almost twenty minutes, ducking in and out of dark alleys, until they had come at last to the small, stone, lamp-lit archway in Kenzington Street that read _Passage to Bell Court. _It was one of four such similar public entrances marking the ends of the brick tunnel that lead to their destination. Once there, they hid in the shadow of the archway, leaning against the walls and gave themselves a spare moment to catch their breath.

Sweeney was the first one to break the silence.

"Anthony," he said hoarsely, in between deep, panting breaths. The sailor looked up, the faintest glisten of perspiration shining on his brow. "Anthony…I want you to take Toby, and the two of you find someplace safe to stay. There's an inn at the far South end of Kenzington; you can get a room there, and I'll come find you once I've---"

"_What??" _Anthony interrupted bluntly, his eyes widening in blank disbelief.

Sweeney looked up at him, his eyes already menacing in a sharp glare, prepared to force his will if he had to.

"You and the boy are going to go someplace safe," he repeated harshly, his voice resonating with an _end-of-discussion _timbre.

Anthony blinked, a twist of anger crossing his face. "I---I'll do nothing of the kind!" he cried incredulously. "Mr. Todd, my _wife _has been taken from me! I'm not going to hide in an _inn _like a coward while she's in danger! I _refuse!"_

Sweeney clenched his jaw, the frustrated anger blazing up inside of him. He bristled, struggling to control his temper as his hands clenched and unclenched. He took a deep breath through his nostrils.

"Anthony. Listen to me. You don't understand what lengths the Beadle is willing to go to. He won't---"

"_I _don't understand what lengths he'll go to??" Anthony exploded. "Mr. Todd, I spent _three days _being held prisoner by that madman! I know perfectly well what vile things he's capable of, and I _don't care! _I am _going _to rescue Johanna, and I am _going _to Bell Court with you!"

"He'll _kill you!" _Sweeney suddenly realized he was nearly shouting, and quickly quieted his voice to a furious mutter, glancing quickly around them to make sure there was no one nearby. "He will _kill you in cold blood, _Anthony, you, and me, and Johanna, and Nel---Mrs. Lovett…even _Toby _if he has to!"

"Don't you see!? That's why we have to go _together! _We must _protect each other! _Mr. Todd, do you honestly believe I'd let you try to take on the entire police battalion _and _Beadle Connor _by yourself? _I thought I'd lost you once, my friend…I won't let it happen again!"

"And I won't let two _boys _walk into their own _deaths _because of _me!! _So help me, Anthony, if you don't take Toby with you _this minute---"_

"Dad."

The voice was small and timid, but it cut through Sweeney's heart like a jolt of scalding water. He stopped dead in mid-sentence, his eyes still narrowed threateningly, and slowly turned his head to look at Toby. _That word…that name…_that moment in the orphanage was the first time he had ever been called that name in his life. He still couldn't quite bring himself to fully comprehend it…the silent riot of feeling and unfamiliar emotions that it set off inside of him. It cut him to the very core…his shoulders relaxed, his hands falling back to his sides, as he looked down at Toby's pleading, wide-eyed gaze. When his dark eyes turned to him, the boy started slightly and swallowed, nervously pursing his lips.

"I---I mean…M-Mr. Todd….I…" he looked down fretfully at his hands, shifting once from foot to foot. "I…I'm goin' with you. I'm goin,' and I'm goin' to take Mum---I mean…Mrs. Lovett---" he looked up, his face suddenly setting in a hard look of defiance. "I'm goin' to get 'er back. I'm goin' to take 'er away from 'im."

Sweeney stared at the boy, heaving a long, weary exhale.

"Toby," he said, as understandingly as he knew how, but unable to mask the heacy frustration in his voice; "You don't understand. This isn't just going to be _dangerous, _it's…it's going to be near _suicide. _It will be a miracle if _any _of us come out of it alive, even…."

He slowly trailed off as he came to the horrible realization that what he was saying was true. Where before, there had been nothing but a cold, emotionless drive of sheer will and determination regarding the seemingly impossible task ahead of them…now, there began to creep in a devastating seed of doubt…of doubt in himself. _What if it was true? What if he wasn't able to rescue them? What if…what if it was already too late?_

_No. _He set his jaw firmly, forbidding himself from continuing the thought. _He couldn't think that way. They were still alive, both of them. They had to be._

_Johanna…._

…_**Nellie**__…._

"I don't care," Toby cried defiantly. Then his voice suddenly dropped and began to crumble. "I…I promised 'er, Mr. Todd. I promised 'er…that I'd never let anyone 'urt 'er."

He hung his head, looking down quietly at his feet. "I promised 'er," he whispered softly.

Sweeney stared at him, his insides twisting uncomfortably, trying futilely to suppress the swell of pity he felt when he looked at the boy's downcast face. He looked up at Anthony, who was watching him with an uncompromising stare as hard as iron.

"I'm going with you, my friend. Whether you like it or not."

Sweeney closed his eyes, lifting his hand to his forehead. For a moment, the three of them were silent. Wooden wheels and horses' hooves on the cobblestones clattered nearby as a hansom rattled past them down Kenzington street. Farther away, a dog barked hauntingly in the distance.

Sweeney sighed heavily, then opened his eyes. There was no helping it.

"We'll need a plan," he muttered heavily in resignation.

In spite of their situation, a broad smile spread across Anthony's face. "We will. And we'll make it _together, _my friend."

"Mr. Todd."

Sweeney looked down at Toby, a strange feeling turning inside of him as he did. His own name, the name Toby had always called him by…_Mr. Todd…_for some reason, all of a sudden, it sounded clumsy and awkward to him.

Toby looked back up at him, his eyes wide again with youthful earnestness.

"I…I 'ave somethin' that belongs to you," he said quietly, slipping his hand inside his jacket. "I been 'oldin 'em ever since we left the farm'ouse…I---I knew where Mu---Mrs. Lovett, where she was keepin' 'em for you, Mr. Todd, an' when I 'eard the…the gunshots, I just…I thought I'd better grab 'em. For safe keepin,' I mean."

Toby closed his fingers around something in his inside pocket, then slowly pulled it out, holding out his palm for them to see.

Sweeney's lips parted. He blinked in stricken, silent disbelief as he stared down at the three gleaming objects in Toby's hand, the faint light from the streetlamps playing off the ornate carvings in their silver handles. He opened his mouth further to speak, but found that he had no words. He slowly lifted out his hand, reaching for them halfway before hesitating. His hand was shaking ever so slightly.

There they were, right before his eyes.

His razors. _His friends._

They had come back to him.

_Friends…my faithful friends….see how they glisten, see this one shine, how he smiles, in the light…_

""Ere, Mr. Todd," Toby said naively, holding them out further to him. "They're yours. I kept 'em for you."

Sweeney pulled his eyes away from the gleaming razors to look into Toby's face. _That name…his name…but suddenly foreign, strange, somehow…_

Slowly, forcing himself to steady his trembling hand, he took the three razors. The metal was still warm from the heat of Toby's body, the heat of his small heart. He shifted two into one hand, and slowly lifted the third to eye-level, turning it, listening to it. He gently opened the blade with his thumb…_snick…_and stared hollowly at his own ghostly, dark-eyed face, reflected in the mirror-like silver. For one silent moment, he closed his eyes, and waited…and waited…and waited…and then he stopped. He didn't feel it---the pulse, the throbbing beat as if from the heart of a living thing, that he had once felt when he held his friend in his hand. The life…the voice, the whispering, the singing and the screaming that he had heard that pale day in his barbershop so long ago, and yet not truly long ago at all_…_it was gone. The razor was empty---nothing but a smooth, silver curve, fit into his palm, held lifelessly in his fingers. He opened his eyes, staring down at it…and then, his eyes moved to past it to look at Toby. The boy was gazing up at him, his youthful features turned into a small, almost proud smile.

Without looking back at it, Sweeney gently folded the razor shut, then put it in the hand that held the others. Without even knowing it---and he wouldn't know it, until a long time afterward---with that single motion, he had just knocked to pieces another one of the invisible walls looming inside of him. Now, there was only one left.

_No. His friends weren't dead. They were resting…their eternal, well-deserved rest. The untroubled sleep of the angels._

_The heartbeat hadn't faded. It had only moved to someplace new._

With his empty hand, he reached and held Toby firmly by the shoulder, squeezing it gently; their eyes met.

"Thank you," Sweeney said, in a broken voice barely above a whisper. Toby smiled at him, and they both knew that no other words need be said.

"Mr. Todd," a clear voice spoke. It was Anthony. As if breaking from a short trance, Sweeney glanced up at him, then back at Toby. He blinked, quickly clearing his head, ignored the sprouting seed of doubt, and turning back to their mission.

_He couldn't stop now. He had to keep himself moving._

"Here," he said suddenly, looking down at the razors in his hand. With a strange, light-weighted sensation as if he floating on air, he took two of the folded blades and handed one to Toby and one to Anthony.

"They're not much," he said practically. "But they're the only protection we have. Keep them hidden."

Toby was blinking at the blade, turning it over in his hands as if was having trouble believing it had actually been given to him. Anthony too gazed speechlessly at his for a moment, before humbly slipping it into an inner pocket of his coat.

"Thank you, my friend."

Sweeney nodded firmly.

"We'd better get moving," he said curtly. "We won't know what we can do until we get there."

Anthony nodded in agreement. "Right. The passage to Bell Court is the longest from this point…we'll have to hurry."

The sailor turned and set off at a half-jog into the dark brick tunnel. Toby was just preparing to bolt after him when Sweeney put his hand flat on his chest and stopped him, gently pulling him back. Toby looked up at him curiously.

"Sir?" he asked. "What is it?"

What Sweeney did next was not premeditated. It was an impulse, sudden and instinctive. One moment he was standing up, looking down at the boy, and the next he was crouching down, looking up at him, his face a few inches below Toby's. The words that came out of his mouth had not been planned. He'd not even had to work up the nerve to put a statement so uncharacteristic to himself into words. They simply came to him, and his voice was calm and quiet as he said them to Toby's innocently blank face.

"Toby. You can call me whatever you like."

There was a second of stunned silence. Toby blinked once…and then, he didn't quite smile, but a change came over him. For an instant his eyes seemed to shine. He nodded his head. He didn't say the word aloud, but his mouth moved silently to form it, and Sweeney felt it's resonation, as clearly as if he'd heard it with his ears.

_Dad._

"Sweeney! Toby! _Come on, we've got to go!" _Anthony's pleading voice echoed down the brick tunnel.

Sweeney quickly straightened up, and for one final instant, he and Toby kept each other's gaze…and then, they were off, winding through the dark, cavernous passage that would lead them to Bell Court, and to the ominous castle of a house where the fate of more than one person would be decided that night.

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

For untold hours, Johanna had tried her hardest to fall asleep. She sat curled on the floor with her back to the wall, her face buried in her arms, telling herself over and over again to go to sleep…if she could only sleep, then the memories would stop…the ghosts would go away, if only for a little while…

_But then…_no. Who was she fooling? Even if she somehow did manage to fall asleep in this dark, empty cell that had haunted her since childhood, the ghosts wouldn't go away. They never went away. They would simply follow her by way of nightmares.

Her reservoir of tears had long since run dry, as had her reserves of energy to scream and bang against the door, though she had tried countless times in the last day. Her body was weak, exhausted for lack of food and water…she could do nothing but sit, her eyes shut against the dark, struggling in vain to block out the memories. For no particular reason other than to hear a human voice, she began to sing softly to herself, her voice raspy and her throat dry.

"_My cage has many rooms, damask and dark…nothing there sings, not even my lark…."_

As if in a dream, she suddenly thought she heard the sound of locks clicking. She curled further into herself, squeezing her eyes tighter shut.

"_Larks, never will you know, when they're captive…"_

Keys were jingling. She didn't know if she was imagining it, or if it was real. Furthermore, she wasn't sure if she even cared.

"…_teach me to be more adaptive."_

The door was suddenly opened, and yellow light flooded inside like the bursting of a sun. Johanna looked up, her eyes squinting and watering almost instantly. She held up a hand and shielded her face, peering almost half-consciously through the doorway. The figure of a man stepped forward, his body blocking the light.

"You're to come with me, miss," he stated blankly.

Johanna didn't move, nor did she speak. She lowered her hand, blinking and staring at the man as if she'd never seen another person before in her life.

The man…a constable, as she realized once her eyes began to adjust and she made out the deep navy of his uniform…sighed exasperatedly. He reached forward and took her by the wrists, pulling her---rather gently, to her great astonishment---to her feet.

"Come on then, miss," he muttered, politely putting a hand on her back and guiding her through the door. Johanna stumbled slightly on her first step, her legs wobbly and weak after nearly a solid day of atrophy. The policeman helped to steady her, then waited patiently for her to inch forward into the hallway. Once she was standing up straight, he reached behind her and closed the door to her wooden cell, then took her by the shoulder and led at her at an even pace down the hallway.

Johanna blinked repeatedly, her chin parallel to the floor and her face blank. She moved like a sleepwalker, staring emptily forward but seeing nothing. After a few moments of complete disorientation, she turned and glanced disbelievingly at the constable guiding her. She blinked again, looking incredulously at his profile. It was the same officer who had literally shoved her into that hellish seclusion early that morning. Why in the world was he being so gentle with her _now?_

"That's right, just follow me, miss," he said comfortingly as they turned a corner. Johanna looked around them. The tilt of this hallway was familiar…she realized that it was the corridor outside what had used to be Judge Turpin's private study. They came to a halt outside the ornately carved mahogany door.

Johanna looked distrustfully at the constable, an unsettling twinge of fear turning inside of her.

_This didn't make sense. It was all just too suspicious._

"Beadle Connor has requested a private meeting with you, Miss Turpin," the constable explained shortly. Johanna instantly jumped with fervent palpitations, her eyes widening in fear.

The constable noticed, and he had the audacious gall to actually chuckle to himself.

"Oh, no need to worry, ma'am," he said warmly, smiling as he reached for the doorknob. "It's certainly nothing you've done wrong. Just a friendly meeting, that's all, Miss Turpin."

In spite of the trembling, panicky terror that was rapidly welling up inside of her, Johanna's eye narrowed fiercely at the name, her fingers clenching suddenly into fists. She glared at the constable, her grey eyes piercing him like needles.

"My _name," _she gritted viciously between her teeth. "Is Johanna _Hope."_

The constable looked taken aback for a moment, then he simply smiled patronizingly.

"Of course it is. My mistake. Here you are…Miss _Hope."_

He turned the brass knob with startling quickness, and Johanna's heart leapt thundering into her mouth as she was abruptly pushed inside, and the door closed behind her with a shuddering _BANG._

Johanna looked up, her chest seizing in fear and her breath coming faster and faster.

Beadle Connor smiled warmly at her. There was a blood-stained bandage secured awkwardly over one corner of his mouth. He unfolded his hands, gesturing to the chair in front of her.

"Welcome, my dear."

A/N; High fives for cliff hangers. Again, apologies for the rather short chapter…I might not get a chance to write again for a while, and I was eager to post this ( I know, I'm impatient ). Reviews have been awesome lately…keep 'em comin', y'all!


	29. Chapter 29

A/N; Hello all! Uh…he he…once again, not the _longest _chapter in the world. Longer than the last one, at least. I'm becoming more impatient with my updates with each passing day…I just love hearing your feedback! ^_^ Anyway, I promise there will be some more long, juicy chapters coming up as soon as possible. For now, here's a little Chappie 29 action for you. Enjoy.

Disclaimer: I don't own Sweeney Todd. You don't own Sweeney Todd. Let's all have a pity party. Together on 3...1---2---3---_aaawwwwwww. _( ^_0 winks. You know who you are (: )

Chapter 29

_Think On Your Sins_

or

_My Gentle Heart_

"_Welcome_, my dear."

For a moment, Johanna simply stared in wide-eyed trepidation at Beadle Connor. She was so stricken with surprise and fear that it was several seconds before she noticed the nature of their surroundings; and then, she moved beyond fear into a veil of sickened, unspeakable horror so potent it defied description. The closest physical response to compare it to was a surge of nearly irrepressible nausea.

Sure enough, she had been pushed into the room that in earlier days had once served as Judge Turpin's study. She had known that even before entering…how could she ever forget the dark, looming shape of that closed door, the door she had passed so many times, wondering what sort of things were happening behind it? But no, what truly ignited the combination of churning disgust and white-knuckled terror deep in the pit of her stomach, was the fact that unlike all the other rooms and corridors of the mansion, _this _room alone had been left almost exactly as it was. The walls, with their olive-toned murals of supple, half-naked figures had not been white-washed over. The lamps with their amber and rose-colored glass had not been replaced. The Persian rugs, the mahogany furniture, the enormous bookcase, and a great number of various odds and ends she recognized immediately as having belonged to Judge Turpin ( including his crystal liquor carafe with matching glasses and his many volumes of expensive, clothbound literature )…none of them had been removed. The room was almost identical to the way she remembered it, right down to the smoky, faintly musky sort of haze that seemed to linger in the air like a smell. In fact, the only immediate differences she noticed were that the tables and chairs had been rearranged, and on one wall that had once been empty there now hung what appeared to be two framed diplomas or awards of some kind. Her heart hammering and her stomach turning, Johanna looked back at the Beadle.

Beadle Connor was sitting in one of Judge Turpin's old armchairs, and in front of him was a small round table laden with what looked to her like the sort of tea and refreshments a very wealthy man would serve if he were trying to impress someone. She swallowed a heavy lump in her throat when, immediately after that thought, she got the distinct feeling that that was indeed exactly what was happening. The little table, covered with a lace tablecloth that drooped halfway to the floor, was nearly spilling over with hand-painted porcelain tea things---so delicate they looked as if a breath of air would crack them---polished glasses filled with reddish-amber liquid that she took to be rum, towers of rich teacakes, plates of toast and sardines, and a number of fruits that were exceptionally fresh-looking for it being the middle of December. Johanna tried not to let the lavish spread distract her, but even as she struggled to look away from it her stomach clenched defiantly with ravenous hunger. It had been the better part of two days since she'd eaten anything.

She narrowed her eyes at the Beadle. _And he knows it, too…._

The Beadle's wounded smile widened suavely.

"How lovely to see you again, my dear," he said, then, noticing that her gaze was fixed on the bloody bandage beside his mouth, chuckled lightly and tossed his hand in the air. "Oh, _this? _You needn't worry over this, my dear, it's merely a trifle. Nothing more than a slight accident from this morning. I never _did_ have the steadiest hands with a razor…but never mind that. Please, do have a seat," he smiled welcomingly, gesturing to the chair across from him.

Johanna swallowed again, setting her jaw nervously. She was trapped like a rat, not only in the study, but in Beadle Connor's leering, unwavering gaze…and even if she somehow managed to escape that, there would be nowhere for her to run. Judge Turpin's mansion had always been cage, but now it had been transformed into nothing short of a fortress. Reluctantly, Johanna slowly eased herself into the chair, her back and shoulders rigid as a wooden board, her fingers fisted tensely in her skirts. She kept her face as blank as possible, her eyes wide and never once straying from the eerily smiling figure in front of her.

"Splendid, splendid," the Beadle said, as casually as if he were sitting down with a friend he'd known for years. "Please, do help yourself, Miss Turpin. I'm certain you must be famished after such a trying day."

The same flare of rebellious anger seared behind Johanna's narrowing eyes as she bluntly corrected, "That's _Mrs. Hope…._sir," she added bitterly.

The Beadle blinked disjointedly for only an instant before his languid grin returned.

"Ah, but of course. Please forgive my forgetfulness, Mrs. Hope," he gestured to the food in front of them. "But all the same, my dear…"

Johanna glared at him for a moment longer, then longingly glanced down at the dishes on the table. Clouds of lusciously scented steam were wafting from the already-filled teacups; the sugar on the cakes glittered and the butter and jam glistened in the ambient gaslight. Her insides contracted again, and her eyes darted fervently between the food and the Beadle's grin for a few suspended seconds…then, like a floodwall bursting, the burning, carnal demanding of her ravenous body won over her mind's terrified flags of warning. She seized the first thing within her grasp---a flaky, golden biscuit---and bit off half of it in one mouthful. For several frenzied minutes, she gave up all lady-like pretense, and the air between them was devoid of conversation save for her delicate chewing and swallowing sounds as she fed her gnawing hunger, pausing in between bites to swallow piping hot gulps of tea. The Beadle simply watched, smiling.

"I suspected you would be hungry," he remarked proudly, tapping his finger in the air. "I'm very glad now that I went to the trouble of arranging the delivery of the meal. The meager provision kept in this place are…how shall I say?…_less _than adequate. They're only meant for the few prisoners in holding, you see. Yes, I'm afraid there's no escaping it…save for this room ( which, as you can see, I've kept intact for my own personal uses ), the Hall of Records is an unfortunately dreary setting indeed. Though I am glad you saw fit to accept my invitation…it's so seldom one has the pleasure of distinguished company in this place!…but then, I needn't tell _you _that. You've seen firsthand the sort we have to deal with."

Johanna paused in mid-chew, her mouth full of apple-slice, and looked up at the Beadle, her grey eyes biting with disdain. _His "invitation?" Yes, as if she'd had a choice…"The sort we have to deal with?" Yes, she'd seen the sort…the "sort" had near as much saved her life on the steps of this stone hell-hole…._

She swallowed, slowly setting the rest down on her plate and straightening in her chair.

"Sir," she said quietly, forcing her voice into the equivalent of a hate-filled scowl. "You will not keep me here. You have no right. I have done nothing to warrant this…_imprisonment."_

The Beadle's lips parted, a hurt expression softening his face.

"_Imprisonment?? _Oh, my dear Miss---Mrs. Hope…surely you don't think of us _that _badly?"

Johanna's jaw dropped, staring incredulously. _Was he joking?_

But his look of regret didn't so much as crack. "You are by no means a prisoner! You are being kept under such close security purely for your own protection! Why, Mrs. Hope, you must understand…_everything_ we've done has been purely for your own protection. Yes, I must admit---it was very abrupt, and…_unnerving_, our small episode on the front stoop…I most sincerely apologize that it was found necessary. But certainly a bright young woman like yourself realizes what terrible atrocities a fiend like Mrs. Lovett is capable of?"

Johanna only blinked. She could think of no words blatant enough to reply to such absurdity.

"Why, if we hadn't brought her to captivity, by any means necessary…heaven only knows what horrors she might have committed, even against _you, _Mrs. Hope, with whom she has no conceivable argument!"

Johanna's eyes narrowed fiercely. "Then why did she come back to save me?" she said blankly.

The Beadle looked taken aback for a brief instant; he firmed his lips, clearing his throat.

"Ah…ah ha…" he half-chuckled. Johanna's knuckles were whitening with rage beneath the table even as he spoke. "My…my dear lady…you don't honestly believe a depraved witch such as she could ever humanly _care _for another person, do you? Surely you aren't so naïve."

"She cared about _me!_" Johanna retorted, the dubious anger rising in her voice. "She cared enough to give herself up!"

The Beadle laughed again, a bit less nervously. "All semantics, my dear, all semantics. Believe me, the _true _Eleanor Lovett is not capable of such a sacrifice. It is indeed fascinating at times, the irrational actions of the desperate criminal…but then, who can fathom a mind twisted with evil?"

Johanna didn't even bother. She shook her head slightly, staring at the imbecile as he suddenly became very concerned with the state of his cufflinks. _Did he honestly think she would buy such nonsense?_

Beadle Connor cleared his throat a second time, flicking his wrists once to indicate the end of the subject.

"However, let us not further waste our time on such an ugly matter," he said briskly, standing up, folding his hands behind him, and taking a few wandering steps across the floor. "I assure you that Mrs. Lovett has been sufficiently dealt with. You needn't be fearful of her anymore."

The words dropped like stones in Johanna's chest, her heart instantly tightening and her eyes widening.

_What did he mean? What had he done to Mrs. Lovett? He couldn't….he couldn't mean…??_

"What I wished to speak to you about, Mrs. Hope, is a matter of gravest importance," he continued, pacing in a slow circle around the room to stand at the window, looking out over the street. "Your wellbeing is, most tragically, in jeopardy, my dear."

Johanna said nothing. She was just barely listening to what the Beadle said…her thoughts were racing, frightened, desperately imagining all the horrible things that could have been done to Mrs. Lovett. It was a peculiar thing…she had heard all about the woman from Anthony, of course, but she had only seen her for the first time less than a day ago, and she had never actually spoken to her at all…but somehow, she felt as if she had known her before. Somehow, she felt as if they had once shared a connection…a kind of brief, forgotten bond. And then, when Mrs. Lovett had given up her only chance at freedom just to save her, her, a girl she'd only just met herself…she couldn't bring herself to believe that someone who would do that was capable of any of the evil things the Beadle said about her.

"You see, Johanna," Beadle Connor rambled on, the sound of her first name uttered familiarly from his lips making her cringe. "I'm afraid you have inadvertently stumbled into a most precarious situation, and that unfortunately you will soon be faced with perhaps a difficult decision."

Johanna glanced up, her heart pounding. The Beadle turned and looked at her.

"I can think of no way to put this without hurting you, so I'll simply have to say in plainest terms, my dear. Your husband is a suspected accomplice of murder."

Johanna's jaw had never dropped in such a potent combination of horror and rage.

"_What??" _she demanded.

The Beadle shook his head, sighing lightly. "Sadly, yes, I'm afraid. It has been well established that Anthony Hope had a pre-existing relationship with the convicted murderers Sweeney Todd and Eleanor Lovett---"

Her jaw dropped, if at all possible, even further. _Murderers?? What in God's name was he talking about!?_

All of a sudden, for no particular reason that she could think of, Johanna's limbs felt incredibly heavy.

"---and that he not only cavorted with them for some time during the happening of these murders, but that he also willingly shielded them and withheld vital information during a police investigation. That is more than enough grounds to have him arrested for suspicion of aiding and abetting in murder."

The Beadle's words began to grow dull and slow in Johanna's ears. Her eyelids were suddenly heavy, too heavy to hold open…they began to flicker wildly, and without knowing it she had leaned forward to prop herself up on the table. Her vision was growing blurry, the colors blending and swimming around her.

_What…what was happening? Anthony…Anthony was in danger…_

_Murderers…murderers?? Mrs. Lovett…Mr. Todd…_

_Mr. Todd…_

…_that night in the barbershop, the horrible, blood-soaked man….his black, soulless eyes, leering down at her…_

The spark of something dark and unfathomably horrible stirred at the very center of Johanna's mind, but her consciousness was fading too swiftly for her to truly grasp what it was. She only knew that a name had appeared where once there had been done, and with that name, the premonition of a fear greater than any she'd known before.

"I have sound reason to believe that Mr. Todd will be coming to give himself up shortly," the Beadle droned on like a heavy buzz in her ears. "For reasons that I shall not trouble you with. Your husband, however, is a different matter. He may decide to flee, or go into hiding somewhere. Without some source of information on him or access to his personal property, it will be exceedingly difficult for the Yard to track him down. And it is regarding this, my dear, that you sadly much make a grave decision."

Johanna's head was growing heavy now, and her neck was bobbing up and down as she struggled to keep it raised. She was bending further and further over the table…she was vaguely aware of the Beadle crossing the room toward her, removing the plate from beneath her face, and replacing it with a long, heavily inked sheet of paper. Johanna blinked groggily, dizzily. Her throat suddenly felt like stone…she couldn't even muster the strength to speak.

"It is my pleasure to inform you, Mrs. Hope, that upon his death the honorable Judge Turpin willed to you the whole of his fortune and his vast financial estates. This---" he said solemnly, taking a grand inhale, "---is the amendment to his will that leaves everything to you. It is as good as a blank check, Mrs. Hope…it need only be signed by a legal notary---someone, such as _myself, _for instance---and shown to the Judge's accountants, and the inheritance will be yours."

Johanna closed her eyes. _The room was hot, so hot…her head was so heavy…_

The Beadle slipped a second, smaller sheet of paper on top of the first.

"However, it is my _regret_ to inform you, that if you do not comply with the requests of myself and the legal offices of Scotland Yard, and sign this contract disbarring yourself from your husband and agreeing to offer any and all assistance requested of you in his capture, then it will be my sad duty to confiscate your title and inheritance as a fine for the deliberate obstruction of justice. And, of course, trial notwithstanding, you will be subject to the standard five years imprisonment included therein. Shall I fetch you a pen, Mrs. Hope?"

In what little remained of her conscious mind, Johanna was screaming---screaming things of such fury and horror and hatred that she had never imagined possible. But on the outside, she said nothing. Her body felt as if it was turning to lead all around her. She fell further and further forward until finally her forehead touched down onto the table, and every one of her muscles went completely slack. Like a dream, like an intangible whisper from some distant imaginary place, she heard Beadle Connor's voice a final time.

"Ah, I expected as much. You've been through so much in such a short time, my dear, no wonder it's left you emotionally distraught. I foresaw such unfortunate discomfort on your part and took the liberty of lacing our tea and refreshments with a strong sedative. I'm glad to see it's eased your troubled state as peacefully as I hoped it would. Have yourself some much-needed rest, my dear, and I'll take care of these tedious legal matters for you. And I sincerely thank you for being so helpful and compliant with our requests, Johanna."

_Damn you…you filthy, son of a…._

But before she could complete the thought, everything went silent and black.

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

When Nellie opened her eyes again, the first thing she saw---blearily at first, then slowly coming into focus as she blinked and sat up, just slightly dizzy---was Daniel standing at the small room's only window, his arms folded and his thumbnail held nervously in his teeth. Nellie blinked, closing her eyes briefly and holding her forehead.

_Daniel. Daniel Northing. Yes, she knew who he was._

Her memory was thick and fuzzy. There was a vague recollection of cool water running over her skin, and then the completely random idea that she must, for some reason, hurriedly prepare several hundred pie crusts for baking…then, nothing, for quite some time. She laid her hand flat on her own forehead, and found that it was warm, but not hot. Her fever---yes…that was what she had, wasn't it?---had gradually begun to go down. The heavy police coat covering her was suddenly much, much too warm. _Everything _was too warm. The sound of her rickety cot creaking and her bare feet touching the floorboards made Daniel jump in surprise, yanking his thumbnail from his teeth and whirling to look at her.

"Oh..oh, n-no…p-please…Mrs. Lovett, you _must _stay in bed, you have n-no idea how c-close---"

Nellie winced at the anxious volume of his voice, waving her hand lightly to silence. _Poor bugger…he means well, I 'spose…_

"It's alrigh', love," she murmured, placing her feet squarely on the floor. The ice-cold boards, amazingly enough, felt marvelous on her skin. "I been in bed long enough…I'll go _barking mad_ if I don' stand up for at least a moment…"

"_Wait!" _Daniel cried.

It was too late. Nellie pushed herself gingerly to her feet---and instantly a twisting, stabbing pain shot up through her right leg, causing her to gasp sharply and pitch forward. Daniel's boots pounded the floor, and he jumped in front her to catch her the moment before she fell. Nellie gripped his arms for dear life, holding her right foot hovering off the floor like a lame dog. Her stunned breath rushed in and out, her wide eyes fixed unseeingly into Daniel's chest. She looked down at her leg, at the blood-soaked bandages wound around it nearly from her knee to her ankle, and she swore angrily under her breath, cursing her forgetfulness.

"Of_ course…bloomin' fool…"_

"Ah…th-there, there," Daniel muttered awkwardly, holding beneath her arms and looking sheepishly down at his feet. Nellie glanced up at his face for moment, her eyes narrowing confusedly at the blush running up his neck. She looked down…and sighed heavily. The front of her dress had been torn somewhat during the session with Beadle Connor…to someone looking down at her, there was a rather impiously generous amount of cleavage visible. _Un-corseted _cleavage, nonetheless.

Another woman would have blushed in return. Nellie simply quirked one corner of her mouth--- almost amusedly---looking up at Daniel with an older, understanding gaze.

"There, there, dearie," she said wistfully, patting him once briskly on the arm. "S'nothin' that ain't been seen before. Jus' 'elp me back down, would you love?"

Daniel was only too eager to oblige. Still blushing slightly, he turned and helped Nellie to hobble to the foot of the cot, then slowly eased her down to sight upright on the edge. She heaved a heavy sigh, folding her arms over her legs, hunching forward slightly. She looked up. The window was near enough that she could gaze out longingly at the tops of the buildings across the street, the smoke from the chimneys turning the black sky even blacker and blotting out the few stars that were visible.

_London. She'd never thought she would miss walking those dirty, sooty streets…_

"M-Mrs….M-Mrs. Lovett," Daniel said quietly. She turned and looked at him. He was still staring down at his feet. "You…y-you really must stay…s-stay in bed a while longer. For a few…for a short…a short while, there, your…your f-fever…I was afraid you weren't go to…m-make it."

Nellie narrowed her eyes at him thoughtfully. _Weren't going to make it?_

She didn't _remember_ feeling as if her fever had been that serious…certainly not to the point of actually being of danger of _dying…_but then, her mind was still dark and fuzzy for the most part, and she could recall much of anything between the minute she first fell asleep on the cot and when she'd awoken just a moment ago.

_Could she really have come that close to dying?_

Daniel shuffled his feet, shyly clearing his throat, and suddenly, for the first time since she'd met him, her heart truly melted. He was, in all ways that mattered, still very much a complete stranger. And yet he was doing so much to help her…putting himself in so much risk…

He looked up, and the moment his bright, innocent hazel eyes looked into hers, she was attacked with horrible stabs of guilt, tightening and aching in her chest. And not only guilt, but worse…a guilt that she _couldn't explain. _Of course Nellie had known guilt in her life. Lord---she probably had more to feel rightfully guilty about than any woman in London. But this…this was different. She hadn't done a single thing to Daniel Northing…honestly, not a thing. So why, then, when she looked at him, looked at those eyes, watching her with such eagerness and innocence…why did she suddenly feel so awful?

"But…M-Mrs. Lovett?" he said, his lips pursing nervously.

Outwardly, her expression hadn't changed---except for a single sad light suddenly gleaming in her eyes---as she answered softly, hoarsely, "What, dearie?"

Daniel swallowed. "I…I th-think…I may have a p-p-plan. A plan to…to get you out of here."

Nellie blinked, her eyes widening---suddenly, it came to her. It wasn't guilt---not the sort of guilt she was accustomed to, at least. No…it was something different. Something warmer, deeper down, something she couldn't remember the last time she'd felt, and really recognized what it was.

It was her _conscience._

Nellie looked away from him.

_She had to tell him. She couldn't let him help her…let him save her…unless she told him the truth. She couldn't deceive him._

A year ago, she would have lied to him. Hell, a _month _ago…the old Nellie would have looked him straight in the eye, worked her face into a pleading, teary, thick-lipped tremble, and told him that she was innocent, that she didn't know why the Beadle was doing this to her. A month ago, she would have told him anything to save herself. Even something as ridiculous as that she was _innocent._

_But look at her now. _

She stared blankly down at the floorboards. She wondered, carelessly, what it might have been that had suddenly changed. Perhaps…._I was afraid you weren't going to make it…_it had been her ( apparently ) close encounter with death?

Or…perhaps it hadn't been sudden at all. Perhaps it had been happening slowly, for a long, long time.

Slowly, sadly…she smiled.

"_Just me gentle 'eart, I 'spose," _she whispered.

"P-pardon?" Daniel stuttered questioningly, taking a step nearer to her. She quickly looked up at him, the smile vanishing instantly. She steadied herself, swallowing thickly.

"Daniel," she said quietly, realizing that she had to work to keep her own voice from stuttering. "Daniel, there's….somethin' you should know."

_Déjà vu. _

The young officer nodded shakily, blinking once.

"Y-yes?"

There was a long pause. Nellie found her breath come harder, her lips parted and almost trembling. Her eyes moved in a slow line around the room, shining, but not tearing. She swallowed twice, then took a deep breath and forced herself to simply say it. _Conscience….it was a bloody bastard. No wonder she'd never missed it before…_

"Daniel, you…you said, before, that you…you didn' know if I was innocent or guilty."

His eyes narrowed, and when she looked up at him she couldn't tell if it was out of suspicion, or fear. He cleared his throat again.

"Ah…y-yes, that's true. But I…I'm no one to…j-judge you, Mrs---"

"Daniel," she interrupted quietly, and all of a sudden the bright shine was a step closer to real tears."I'm not innocent."

Silence….for a long, calm moment…._silence._

Nellie held his gaze, the light in her eyes quivering, waiting. Daniel looked back at her, and she slowly realized that it was neither suspicion, nor fear, nor even anger in his face. It was…_could it be? _Sympathy.

_Informed _sympathy.

Nellie shook her head in disbelief. He didn't even have to say anything for her to know what his decision was. It was written in his eyes as clear as day.

"Why, Daniel?" she whispered. "Why would you still 'elp me? All the terrible things 'e's told you about me…all the 'orrible things 'e says I've done…they're…they're _true. _'E's missed the point, and 'e's off on…well, quite a bit, but…the _things, _Daniel, the awful things…._they're all true."_

The silence continued. Nellie smiled incredulously, the shine getting as close to tears as it would before they fell. She looked away from him.

"I don' understand," she whispered, smiling sadly.

There was another pause, then the gentle sound of footsteps, and she quickly turned her head as Daniel knelt down on one knee beside her on the floor. She stared into his hazel eyes as he gingerly, somewhat awkwardly, put one hand on her forearm.

"I don't care," he said, his voice barely audible. "I don't care if you're guilty."

Nellie blinked at him. _"How?" _she mouthed soundlessly.

He shook his head, and for the first time since she'd met him, he smiled…the smallest smile in the world, but there it was.

"Mrs. Lovett. Listen to me. You may be guilty. You may really have done all the…the _terrible _things that Beadle Connor says you have."

He leaned slightly closer, and Nellie lowered her tearing gaze to look straight into his face. When he whispered, the smile dropped, and was replaced with a glowing kind of light that for a long moment, she couldn't recognize.

"But that doesn't mean that this is right," he said. "That doesn't mean that what the Beadle is doing is _right. _Mrs. Lovett, I…I…this isn't the first time I've worked under Bea---under _Howard _Connor. I've only been with Scotland Yard for less than a full year, but I've _seen things…_things…things I wish I could unsee. Connor has only been the Beadle of this district for a few weeks. Why do you think he was released from his _old district?"_

Nellie's eyes narrowed, a spark of simultaneous confusion and realization lighting behind the tears.

"He _did things, _Mrs. Lovett. I don't have to tell you what. You've seen them…and now, now he's doing them again. They hushed it up the first time---I'm sure the late Judge Turpin had something to do with that---but they dismissed him from his former district with a _warning_, a warning that should the same things start to happen again, they weren't going to be overlooked."

His hand suddenly grew protectively tighter around her forearm.

"That's why he's allowed me to look after you, Mrs. Lovett. He's _afraid. _In that room, after he…shot…you…after you fainted, he became _terrified. _He released more than half of the battalion at once---suddenly acted as if we didn't need nearly as much manpower. It's because he was _afraid, _afraid they'd find out what happened and report it. The force has been getting warier and warier of him for days---even the ones closest to him---they're starting to see what a _monster _he really is, starting to get scared that he never follows protocol. The only officers left in the building are the two from the interrogation, myself, and two others guarding the first floor doors. He immediately allowed me to take you somewhere to dress your wounds, because if you had died, Mrs. Lovett…if _he had killed you…_it would have been over for him."

Nellie listened, her mind racing to take everything in, her gaze fixed on Daniel's face.

"Daniel," she said quietly, seriously. "'As 'e…'as 'e…_before?"_

Daniel's young features suddenly became explicitly grim.

"I was working under him then, too," he answered, turning his eyes away. "I saw it. A…a woman. I didn't know if she was guilty, either. We never know if they're really guilty or not. It was in a closed room, just us, him, and her…just…just like with you. She wouldn't answer him. She screamed through the whole thing, shook me to my soul, but she'd never answer him, never say a single word. He got the gun to threaten her, and…he just…it…he…he got off free, played it off as an accident, but…I _saw _him, I saw the _look, _when he_…_when he…"

Daniel trailed off, the hard set in his face suddenly weakening. Nellie's tears replenished at the look, but they never fell. She silently took his hand in her free one and squeezed it gently. He looked up at her, and for a moment she thought his eyes were shining in return.

"I couldn't let it happen again, Mrs. Lovett," he whispered, his voice shaking. "Not again. Not…not another woman. I've seen terrible things, Mrs. Lovett…I've stood by and done nothing, while terrible things were going in right in front of me. I don't care if you're innocent, Mrs. Lovett. I don't care if you're guilty. This isn't right…for _anyone. _This isn't the law. This isn't justice. This…this is _sadism."_

Through her tears, through her aching conscience and trembling hands…Nellie smiled at him. She had believed, once, a long time ago, that there were still good people left in the world. She thought she'd outgrown such a foolish idea some time ago. The smile broadened a bit, and the tears quivered on her eyelashes.

'_Spose not, eh? _

_Just me gentle 'eart…._

Daniel leaned forward, so that his face was close below hers, looking up at her past his brow. He spoke very quietly.

"Mrs. Lovett. I'm _going to get you out of here."_

She laughed briefly, sniffling, dashing her hand across her eyes and clearing her throat.

"Daniel. You're not stutterin,' love."

The brave look immediately vanished from his face, and was replaced so quickly by an embarrassed flush that she had to struggle not to laugh aloud. He hurriedly stood up and moved to the window, his hands held nervously in front of him as he looked outside, his eyes turned pointedly away from her.

"Oh…well, ah…" he muttered, shrugging unconvincingly. "It…ah…it c-comes and…and it g-goes, I…I s-suppose…"

Nellie smiled at him, and realized that the heavy ache in her chest was just a little bit lighter.

_Conscience, eh?_

_I suppose I could learn to live with it…_

"Daniel," she said. He sheepishly glanced at her out of the corner of his eye.

"Thank you," she whispered. He blinked, shook himself, and looked away again.

"You're…you're w-welcome."

There was a long moment of stilted silence. The room was unbelievably quiet. Nellie fought the urge to giggle. Maybe it was her new lightness of heart…maybe it was the tiny, highly improbable, nearly _impossible _spark of hope that had come alive inside her…the hope that maybe, just _maybe, _there was yet a way that she would get out of this place and see Toby and Mr. Todd again. Or, maybe, it was just the awkward way Daniel was wringing his hands and avoiding her gaze. She smiled warmly at his young profile.

_There are…perhaps there really are decent people in the world, yet._

After a sufficient absence of conversation, Daniel cleared his throat, still fixing his gaze out the paned window.

"W-well…ah…ah, Mrs. Lovett…would you…l-like to hear, what…what I had in mind?"

Nellie nodded leaning forward to listen. "All ears, love."

He coughed lightly. "Well, ah…I thought…I…it's very simple, really. I thought…I might t-tell B-Beadle Connor, that…that your fever hadn't gone down, and that I was v-very worried you might…m-might even die, if we didn't get you to…t-to a real h-hospital within the n-night. He was so nervous, after you…after you fainted, I can't…c-can't believe he wouldn't agree. Then, if I could just…j-just f-fix it, so that you and I could be in a coach to ourselves…I could say it best…b-best for your condition, to have p-plenty of air, or something…none of them kn-know, know anything about it, they just might…b-believe…and then, when we got there, we could…we could s-slip away, or…or…." he trailed off weakly, suddenly leaning forward, his mouth opening slowly and his eyes narrowing as he stared at something through the window.

Nellie sat up straight. "Daniel?"

His brow lowered even further in disbelief. His line of vision was pointed down at the street.

Nellie scooted forward as close to the edge of the cot as she could, tensing as the pain circuited up and down her leg with every movement. "Daniel?" she winced. "Daniel, what is it?"

He turned to her, and the look on his face was entirely impossible for her to classify.

"M-Mrs. Lovett…what…what does…M-Mr. Sweeney Todd…what does he look like?"

For one split second, everything stopped. Every last trace of expression dropped from her face like water through a sieve, and she stared blankly at him for one eternal instant. Then, without so much as a word, she pushed herself off the cot. She shoved against it so hard with her hands that it slid back the few inches and slammed loudly into the wall…her body rocketed onto her feet…or rather _foot…_kept her right leg suspended in the air, all of her weight balancing and swiveling on her left foot. She immediately began to pitch forward, but she had planned to; she grabbed hold of Daniel's shoulder, bracing herself against him and pushing him aside to stare down out the window, ignoring his meek cries of protest. She couldn't hear him, besides. The only thing she could hear was the deafening, pulsing beat of her own heart as it thudded slowly in her ears, like a dying lifeline. And in between each beat was one word, repeated over and over…

_No…no…no…no…_

She stared down at the empty, lamp-lit street in front of the mansion. She scanned her gaze wildly up and down it, her breath growing faster and faster, but remaining perfectly silently. For a full two minutes that felt like an eternity, she searched in total silence, barely even feeling the warmth of Daniel's shoulders in her arms.

Slowly, ever so slowly, her heart began to slow. _She didn't see anything…nothing, no one, anywhere…maybe…maybe…_

Her eyes fixed at a point on the corner, on the opposite side of the street, where the lamp was close enough to the curb that there was a very dark, concealing shadow just beside the stone wall. She didn't know why, and she didn't think to wonder why at the moment. But for some reason, she stared at that shadow for almost a full minute.

When it flashed into her vision, it was like a blink of lightning…so fast, she blinked, her heart once more speeding into overdrive, the word rising to a fevered, high-pitched scream in her mind…_no, no, no, no, she was wrong, she had to be wrong…_

She saw it again.

Longer this time. But still only a momentary glimpse of something moving in the darkness. Her eyes grew wide, staring, not wanting to believe it, but knowing it was there.

_A white streak._

A single white streak, shooting through the darkness above a pale, white face. It was only there for a moment. Then it vanished. But she had seen it. As sure as she felt her heartbeat suddenly drop to a faint flutter in her chest…she _had seen it._

"_Daniel," _she whispered, her voice so faint it was scarcely audible.

"Mrs. Lovett," he answered, in a voice whose tone she could not quite determine, "Is it…_is it?"_

"_Daniel….we have to do it now."_

A/N; Mwahaha! ( mutters to self…._suspense, suspense, suspense…) _We should finally see some real action start to happen, now. I really tried to flush out Daniel's character as much as possible in this chapter…he was seeming just a little flat to me. Hope it worked! And oh, before I forget…_HOLY FLAMING LITERARY FANFARE, _for breaking the 300 review barrier!! You people are the cheese to my fictional macaroni.


	30. Chapter 30

A/N; It's a milestone chapter, everyone! 30 whole staves devoted to this silliness! ^_^ I kid, I kid. But seriously, if you'd have told me this story would end up being more than _30 chapters long _when I first started it, I'd have said you were on crack. Anyway…it's not _quite _as long as I'd hoped, but it is, if I may say so myself, sufficiently juicy. Enjoy!

Disclaimer; I don't own Sweeney Todd. You don't own Sweeney Todd. But evidently I have enough free time on my hands to write _30 chapters of fan fiction _about Sweeney Todd, so I guess that counts for something.

Chapter 30

_His Throat Is Bare Beneath My Hand_

or

…_Desperate Measures are Called For_

His heart was thudding in his ears.

_Deafeningly._

Of course, this in itself was nothing too remarkable…it seemed that all his heart was interested in _doing_ nowadays was thudding loudly in his ears. But what did made this particular thudding remarkable was that he could _hear _it, but he couldn't _feel _a single thing. The sound of the pulsing beats was practically drowning out Anthony and Toby's hushed voices, and yet there wasn't so much as the hint of a sensation in his chest. _Nothing, _not a pound, not a touch, not a tremor. He was hollow…stone, leaden, a husk without feeling. He stood with his back flat against the stone fence, silently---and ironically---thanking heaven that the night was colder than usual, even for the wintertime, discouraging even the bravest of night owls from venturing away from their wool blankets and warm fires. The streets of Bell Court, and indeed of every block they had passed within the last fifteen minutes of the journey, were virtually deserted. Sweeney cast a quick glance up and down the dark road, just to make sure. It was as still and silent as a graveyard.

Still, and silent, of course…with the exception of his heartbeat.

_THUMP. THUMP. THUMP. THUMP._

_Mrs. Lovett…_

"Mr. Todd, what do you see?"

_THUMP. THUMP._

…_**Nellie. **_

_She was there, just inside those walls…alone, waiting…_

Without realizing it, his hand lifted a few inches from his side, as if longing to reach out and hold the air between them.

_Just inside those walls…so close, and yet so impossibly far away from him…_

_THUMP, THUMP, THUMP…._

"Mr. _Todd!"_

He blinked, his hand dropping, scowling slightly to himself as he willed his head to clear and his mysteriously numb chest to cease its thought-hampering palpitations. He turned to Anthony.

"What does it _look like_?" the young man asked fervently---and for the second time, he realized.

Silently, without so much as crunching the snow beneath his boots, Sweeney leaned to his right and peered around the corner of the wall again.

_Judge Turpin's mansion. _He couldn't help but feel a venomous shudder of disgust and hatred as he stared at the grand, menacing structure. His fists clenched, his eyes narrowed and his lip tightened with the urge to sneer.

And then, abruptly---so abruptly it made him blink and pause, looking inward with a swiftly growing sense of dread---his anger was underlined by something else. Something that suddenly filled him with the almost overwhelming desire to curl into a ball and hold the back of his head with his eyes squeezed shut. He stared, unable to tear his eyes away, at the stone pillars and sculpted gargoyles and glowing windows and lantern-lit front entrance of the mansion.

_This…this was where it all happened. This was the place, sixteen years ago, where Lucy…his Lucy…had been destroyed._

Beneath the surface of his subconscious, he heard Mrs. Lovett's voice speaking softly, tunefully, almost like she was singing to him, as she stared blankly, emptily, into the small fire in her parlor.

"_Well, Beadle calls on her all polite, poor thing…poor thing…the Judge, he tells her is all contrite…he blames himself for her dreadful plight…"_

All at once the mansion seemed to double in size, looming over him like an impregnable colossus, and all at once their task seemed impossible. More than impossible…_ridiculous. _He had already lost two women to the evil hunger of this house…what made him, a _barber, _armed with nothing but a few razors and two boys too innocent to possibly use them, think that he had any chance of stopping the same thing from happening to a third?

…_Nellie…_

"…_she must come straight to his house tonight…poor thing!"_

_Lucy…_

"_**Poor thing**__!"_

The sinking dread grew stronger, balling in the pit of his stomach like a rock, taking his breath away. Thoughts, images, things that he had not allowed himself to think about once for almost a year…sprang forward out of his imagination. His eyes narrowed in the horrible inability to stop himself from imagining the whole scene, bit by bit, in graphic, unholy detail…the spinning figures, hidden behind their masks, the Judge's carnal, poisonous leer, Lucy's golden hair tangled in his clenching fingers as he held her down, as he ripped her skirts in two from the floor up…the flash of her white teeth as she screamed the ragged, purposeless scream of the _used---_the scream that is made all the more terrible by the fact that its owner knows there is nothing they can accomplish by screaming…and do it anyway. The horrible images, stamped in living color in his mind like the pictures of a book…

"_They figured she had to be daft, you see, so all of 'em stood there and laughed, you see…"_

_Laughed…laughed…laughed at…at…_

…_Lucy…as he…the Judge…_

"_Poor soul…poor thing!"_

Without the slightest warning, Sweeney's mouth turned up into a broad, miserable smile. _Barker._

"So," he heard himself whisper under his breath. "It haunts even you, Sweeney Todd?"

"What?_" _Anthony questioning voice seeped through to him. _"_Sweeney?_"_

Sweeney shook himself, the smile immediately dropping into a sharp glare. He could practically feel it as Barker retreated back into his mind after his split-second appearance.

_Just long enough to torment me, _Sweeney thought gloweringly.

He looked blankly at Anthony. The sailor moaned in frustration.

"_Well??" _he pressed desperately. "How _is it, Mr. Todd??"_

Sweeney forced himself to look back at the mansion one more time. Firmly, furiously, with a newfound spring of determination, he narrowed his brow defiantly toward it. His hand, involuntarily, like an instinct, slowly moved to rest, poised, over the razor at his hip.

_No. He couldn't give in to it…not now. He couldn't let anything distract him, not Barker, not his memories, not his horror or hatred or sorrow…_

…_not even Lucy._

He closed his eyes, just for a moment.

_I'm sorry._

For once…for perhaps the first time, in his entire life…he intentionally forced himself to forget her.

_I can't think about Lucy. Not now. Not when she's so close…_

In his head, Barker was laughing. A sick, desperate, joyless kind of laugh.

_Forget her, Todd?? You really are a madman. You could no more forget her than you could forget how to breathe!_

Sweeney ignored him, ignored the fluttering heat as the feeling of his heartbeat abruptly returned to him.

_Maybe he's right. Maybe I can't forget her. Maybe…I never will._

_Lucy…I'm sorry…_

…_**but I have to try.**_

He opened his eyes. He turned to Anthony and Toby, who were crouched beside him in the dark shadow between the stone wall and the streetlight. Their wide eyes watched him intensely, nervously, waiting.

"Well?" Anthony repeated eagerly.

"The carriage-house is dark," Sweeney said quietly, his voice hoarse and low. "…and there's no one guarding the doors…on the _outside, _at least. The Beadle must have them stationed inside someplace. We can't risk using any of them."

Anthony's face darkened worriedly. "Then how are we going to get inside, my friend?"

Sweeney let himself slide slowly down the wall, crouching down on his haunches and staring pensively at the ground, his mind working furiously, running through every feasible approach, every possible plan. Toby and Anthony hunkered down beside him, leaning forward anxiously. For a long moment, they sat there in complete silence as Sweeney thought.

Slowly, he opened his eyes again, and turned to look at them. _Anthony…Toby…_ Their faces---so young, so innocent…waiting expectantly, ready to do the first thing he would ask of them without a moment's pause…

_There was no other way._

He looked at them grimly, his voice completely blank and factual as he spoke.

"I'll turn myself in."

The two boys blinked simultaneously.

And simultaneously, their voices rose in incredulous, high-pitched cries of protest. Sweeney resisted the brief urge to close his eyes and growl in frustration.

"_What? _Have you…my friend, have you _lost your mind??"_

"Are you barkin' mad? You _can't _turn yourself in, Dad, you _can't! _They'll 'ave you dead the moment you're in the door!"

"We've been through this, Mr. Todd, you _are not _going in there alone! We're going to handle this _together!"_

"You _can't!"_

"You mustn't!"

"You _can't!!"_

"_Quiet!" _Sweeney hissed, so viciously it silenced both of them in mid-sentence. They halted, looking at him in twin expressions of disbelieving refusal.

"Mr. Todd, if you give yourself up---if he gets a hold of _you _as well_---_Johanna and Mrs. Lovett are as good as---"

"_What other choice do we have??" _he snarled, cutting Anthony off. His heart thudded in his ears. "_I'm _the one Beadle Connor is most eager to capture. _I'm _the one who has to surrender. Now _listen _to me, _both of you. _Toby, you're going to stay _right here _and you'll not make so much as one _sound. _If anyone, I mean _anyone, _comes near you at all, you're going to run. You're going to run away and find someplace safe to hide. Anthony, you are going to take me as a hostage and offer me to Beadle Connor in exchange for Johanna and Ne---and _Mrs. Lovett. _I'm the one who killed his brother and the Judge…it's me who he'll be the most willing to trade for."

Anthony was shaking his head, his eyes frantic and desperate.

"But Mr. Todd, it's not as if Beadle Connor is a man who can simply be reasoned with!What if he won't accept the trade at all?"

Sweeney looked away, his face set and his eyes hard and cold.

"Then you'll give me to him anyway."

Anthony's jaw dropped, and Sweeney cut the words off even before they had a chance to rise in his throat.

"It's the best we can do," he growled sternly, shooting the boy a silencing glare. "At least then I'll be on the inside and able to think of a move from there, and you and Toby will still be safe."

"_No!" _Toby cried angrily. "I won't let you!"

"You don't have a choice!" Sweeney barked at him, instantly wincing at his own volume, cursing himself and lowering his voice back to a sharp whisper. "You don't have a _choice," _he repeated uncompromisingly. "This is the _only way _for even one of us to get inside the house alive."

Toby fell silent, his face twisting and looking as if he were struggling not to burst into outraged, impotent tears. Anthony only stared, his face pale and drawn in grim futility. He looked down and nodded softly.

"I…understand, Mr. Todd."

Sweeny nodded once, firmly. He took a deep breath, held it a moment in vain attempts to still his pounding heart, and gave a long, slow exhale.

_Don't let yourself feel. Don't let yourself remember._

_Just think of her. _

_Only her._

He gravely stood up, offering a hand to Anthony and lifting him to his feet. Toby followed, glaring furiously up at him. For a moment, Sweeney's gaze softened toward him, and he was shocked and made uneasy by the sudden realization that he wanted to put his hand on Toby's head…for possibly the last time. His eyes turned with a strange light, and he surprised himself even further by actually doing it. He spread his fingers, reached forward, and laid his hand over Toby's head, gently ruffling his hair. The boy's angry, shining eyes turned stubbornly away from him.

"I'm sorry, son," he said quietly, discovering that he truly meant it. "This is the only way."

Toby kept his face pointed down, refusing to look at him. Sweeney slowly let his hand fall away, sighing, and was about to turn away when the boy's small, angry voice called him back. With his eyes glued stubbornly to the ground---_or, perhaps…was he just trying to hide the traces of his tears?---_Toby muttered brokenly under his breath,

"You'd better not die."

Toby lifted his eyes slowly to look him in the face. They were clearly shining with tears now, but he sniffed bravely and held them back.

"You're…you're the only dad I ever 'ad. I'll---_sniff---_I'll…I'll never forgive you if you die."

Sweeney, in spite of himself, smiled. A sad smile.

"I'll do my best," he said quietly through it.

He ran his hand through Toby's hair one final time, then forced himself to look away, because suddenly there was a lump in his throat that he didn't like the feel of.

He steadied himself. He exhaled slowly.

_The time had come. He was there. Nothing left to plan, nothing left to prepare, nowhere left to go---except forward. He was there._

_Everything had come to this._

He looked up at Anthony, and nodded. The two of them turned and stepped around the corner to face the dark mansion looming before them in the night.

The moment they did, Sweeney's eyes shot open and he gasped so sharply and silently that his breath caught like a painful stab in his chest.

A figure was standing there on the street corner in the glow of the lamppost, five feet in front of them. It was a young man, tall, lean, but solidly built, with a crop of short, chestnut-brown hair and hazel eyes that stood out even in the semi-darkness. He was staring straight at them, his lips parted in the faint, almost blank expression of a paralyzed animal. The brass buttons of his coat gleamed in the glow of the lamp. He was a police officer.

"M-M-Mr…Mr…._Mr. T-Todd?"_

Sweeney didn't think. He was seized in a fray of instant panic like none he had ever experienced. He had felt something only slightly similar when, in a moment from another lifetime, he had beaten Davy Collins senseless with a teakettle.

His movement was like that now. He didn't stop to think, didn't stop to curse himself for not hearing the constables footsteps or not checking again to make absolutely sure they were alone. He didn't pause for an instant. In one fluid, almost graceful motion, he reached behind him and pushed Anthony back before he could step into the light, while simultaneously seizing the razor from his hip and flipping it open with a fierce, rapid _snick_. His eyes burned with black fire as he reached forward and sliced, the motion so swift the blade made a delicate _ssssssing_ as it zipped through the air. He struck flesh. His breath hesitated, still and frozen in his throat, his eyes wide and the blood rushing through his veins.

For one second, the air was rent with a cry of startled pain, the stumble of a body falling down backward on the pavement…and then, nothing.

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

Nellie stood, wavering on one foot in front of the window, gripping the sill for balance as her wide eye scanned desperately on the dark street below. Her pulse was racing and her palms were shaking and clammy. She pursed and unparsed her lips repeatedly as her gaze darted back and forth, searching, but always coming to rest at the same dark spot on the corner.

_She'd seen him…she knew, she __**knew **__she'd seen him….no, she had to be wrong, had to be mistaken…she __**had **__to be…oh, God, God in heaven, why did he come??_

"_Sweeney," _she whispered inaudibly beneath her breath, the hysterical panic threatening to take hold of her. "_Sweeney, Sweeney…why? Why didn't you just stay away??"_

"_Just leave it to me, Mrs. Lovett," Daniel had said scarcely sixty seconds ago as he struggled to sit her back down on the cot. "I'll go and see if it's really him. I'll go and tell them I just want to make a check of the perimeter…they'll listen to me, I promise…"_

_She was crying and jabbering in a senseless frenzy. "NO! NO! Don't go outside, don't go to 'im…let's go, let's jus' go right now! Tell them I'm dying, tell them you're takin' me to the 'ospital! Tell them __**anything**__, jus' GET ME OUT OF 'ERE!"_

"_Please….please, just calm down, Mrs. Lovett!" Daniel pleaded, grabbing her shoulders and forcing her to sit still and look at him. "Just let me go and I'll---"_

"_**NO! **__Please, Daniel, please, jus' take me away from 'ere!! Take me away before 'e tries to come and get me, PLEASE!"_

"_I won't be a minute," Daniel assured her gently. She barely noticed that his stutter had miraculously vanished once again. "I'll tell him what's going on, I'll explain to him our plan."_

"_Don't, Daniel, don't! 'E won't listen! 'E'll try to take me 'imself and 'e'll go and get 'imself ruddy KILLED! Please, let's jus' go, let's jus' go NOW!"_

"_I'll be right back," he said over his shoulder as he seized his coat from the cot, dashed across the room and closed the door swiftly behind him._

"_DANIEL!" she'd shrieked. "PLEASE!"_

_The lock clicked shut, and the room fell into total silence._

_Frantically, her chest heaving as if she'd been running, she again pushed all of her strength against the cot and propelled herself onto her foot, groping forward and grabbing the window sill before she fell._

Now, Nellie lifted her hand to mouth and began attacking her fingernails with her teeth without even realizing it. Her eyes flew madly everywhere….left, right, left, right, up and down the street, searching, searching desperately for the streak of white, yet praying just as desperately that she wouldn't find it.

_God…please…please, let him be gone…let me not have seen him….let me have imagined it…please, God…please, don't let him be here, I'll do anything, anything…._

…_please…._

She yelped in shock and whirled around haphazardly, wobbling and nearly tumbling off-balance, when the lock clicked sharply and the door was suddenly opened again. Her fingers clutched the sill behind her for dear life, her heart skipping a hollow beat and a wave of dread coursing through her when she saw in the doorway, not Daniel, but Beadle Connor. He was still bareheaded and in his shirtsleeves, though they'd been rolled down and buttoned at the cuffs once again. A vicious glare of contempt burned forth from his eyes. The dried, brown, blood-stained bandage at the corner of his mouth where she'd stabbed him with the pen added an frightening element of unpredictable violence to his appearance.

"Thought we'd leave you alone, did you?" he sneered condescendingly, suddenly lifting his hand and snapping his fingers. "Thought you'd steal a little time to plot out your next cowardly, underhanded attack on an unsuspecting servant of the people?"

One of the constables appeared immediately behind him, and he stood aside to let him through the door. Nellie's eyes widened and she pressed herself back against the window as he stalked toward her, his shoes thundering woodenly on the floor. She raised one hand in vain to shield herself, but he seized her and spun her to face the wall as easily as if she were nothing but a rag doll. She wobbled dangerously on her one leg as her face was pushed into the glass while he fastened the manacles once more around her wrists.

"Well, I'm afraid you won't be having that opportunity, my dear," the Beadle growled informatively. "And I assure you, you won't be given any more _pens _either. Yes, you've had quite enough recovery time, I believe, fever or not. It's time you were moved into a more _appropriate _room…and the instant Northing returns to inform me if---"

As he spoke, as she winced against the cold glass mashing into her cheek…Nellie spotted something in the corner of her eye. She stared wildly down at it, her breath heaving in and out and leaving circles of white fog on the window beside her mouth. The Beadle's voice suddenly fazed out of importance and became nothing but a dull buzz in her ears.

Her eyes were wide, the whites shining frantically as she stared down at the painful angle.

A tall, sturdy figure in a constable's coat, dark, alone…_Daniel. _He stood by the streetlight, his back to the corner, looking around him and taking slow, backwards steps.

As she watched, he appeared…before her very eyes, like a ghost out of the shadow. The white streak blazed in the dark tangle, the white face, the black eyes, like the sunken sockets of a skeleton…he stepped into the glow of the lamppost, and froze. Daniel turned around, and for a split second, they simply stared at each other.

Nellie felt as if she were dreaming. She stared, breathless, unblinking.

She stared as Sweeney…her Sweeney…seized something from his side and slashed it at the level of Daniel's face. Her pupils dilated as a tiny, lightning-fast pinprick of silver, like a shooting star, flashed in the darkness and was gone. Daniel fell backwards onto the street.

At that instant, the constable dragged Nellie away from the window.

"_NO!!!" _

"SILENCE!" the Beadle roared.

Nellie barely heard him. She was fighting, thrashing, pulling with all her one-legged might against the manacles, craning her head as far as she could over her shoulder, not even caring as her neck twisted painfully, her hair falling over her eyes, shaking it loose, struggling to see out the window…she was too far from it, it was only a dark square of glass. She screamed and fought, tears flushing to her eyes and running down her cheeks.

"_NO! NO! LET ME GO! LET ME---"_

"I said _SILENCE!!"_

"_OOF!" _Nellie's voice cut off sharply as the wind was knocked from her by Beadle Connor's fist in her stomach. She doubled over, her hair falling over her face and shielding it from view. She shook her head back and forth, the tears streaming continuously as she mumbled hysterically to herself, sobbing.

"No, no, no, no…no, no, 'e didn't…'e _didn't…_'e didn't know…no..no…_no…"_

"Quiet!" the Beadle raged, his face red and a vein throbbing at his temple. Nellie squeezed her eyes shut, the pain overwhelming her, too great, too horrible, too unreal for her to keep speaking. Her mouth worked fevered and soundlessly, forming silent words of despair.

_Daniel…Daniel…no…_

_Sweeney…he didn't…he couldn't…how could he? He didn't know, he didn't know…it wasn't his fault…Sweeney…._

_How could he? How __**could he??**_

_Daniel, oh, God, Daniel…_

…_it was her fault, it was all her fault…_

"No…no, no, no, _no…'e was only…it's not 'is fault, they were just trying to…."_

"I would think we'd have proven to you by now that ridiculous theatrics will get you nowhere, but I suppose _some_ people simply won't be helped," the Beadle sneered contemptuously. He jerked his head sharply toward the officer. "Get her out of my sight!" he ordered, his voice echoing shortly in the empty room. "Lock her in one of the private cells. I'll deal with her later myself."

Nellie didn't move a single muscle as the constable tried to drag her away. She was doubled over, hands bound behind her, eyes squeezed shut, the world dark, spinning…nothing was real, it couldn't be real, Daniel…Daniel couldn't be dead…Sweeney couldn't have killed him…

_Her fault. It was all her fault._

In the end, the constable was forced to pick her up and carry her. She didn't so much as open her eyes.

_It was all her fault._

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

In reality, it was less than ten seconds, but to Sweeney, the pause of complete silence after he'd lashed out with the razor seemed to last an eternity.

The only sound was his heart. His incessant, insufferable heartbeat forever thundering in his ears. _THUMP. THUMP. THUMP._

The unknown constable lay sprawled on his back on the cobblestones. His body had fallen within the circle of light from the lamppost, but from the shoulders up he had landed just outside of it, his face and head cast in black shadow and too dark to distinguish. Sweeney squinted, his chest heaving with adrenaline, his arm still poised in midair...he couldn't tell where he had cut the police officer, or even if he was still alive or not. A single line of blood dripped from the razor. He glanced at it for a split second, the sharp, dark color of the crimson gleaming over the silver as it shined in the lamplight. His heart pounded, and a strange, unrecognizable sensation began to wash over him.

_He hadn't so much as hesitated. Not even for an instant. _

_One look, one second of panic…and it was like he'd been stripped instantaneously back to his core, and instinct had taken over. He was like…like a wild animal that had been caught and tamed and put in a circus, and one day ten years later, all it takes is just the littlest start---and instantly, the savage instinct returns as if it had never left, and someone has their face bitten off._

_**No **__hesitation at all? Not even one second?_

Anthony was on his feet, his terrified breath rushing in and out through his teeth.

"Mr. Todd?? Sweeney, are you alright??"

He didn't turn to look. He was staring down at the constable's body lying in the ring of light. The hand that gripped the razor had started trembling violently without his realizing it. All of a sudden a very simple question occurred to him. So simple, so obvious, in fact, that he was utterly amazed he had not thought of it sooner.

_Had he been planning to kill Beadle Connor?_

Sweeney blinked. His arm slowly lowered back to his side, his shaking hand closed in a death grip on the handle of the razor. He blinked again. He wasn't breathing at all.

Less than ten seconds. But it had felt like an eternity.

He heard a small sound. He drew a sudden breath, and turned to look down at the constable. He watched the police officer slowly sit up, groaning lightly as he did, his hand held over one side of his face…and Sweeney's mouth opened speechlessly and his eyes stared narrowly, and his fingers gripped the razor to tightly it was painful. The unrecognizable sensation he'd felt a few seconds ago wasn't unrecognizable at all. He knew exactly what it was. It had been _fear. _Honest, trembling, pale-faced, stomach-turning fear. For one instant, he was sure he'd killed the police officer…and it had _terrified _him.

The officer got to his feet, looking up at Sweeney and Anthony ( and Toby, who, ignoring Sweeney's instructions for him, had run straight into the light to stand beside them ) with a stunned look in his hazel eyes. Sweeney didn't move, didn't so much as look away from him. He was paralyzed by an unparalleled rush of relief that he hadn't killed the man---or boy, rather, the officer didn't look as if could be more than a year older than Anthony---but coupled with it was the shocking epiphany that he…_he, _Sweeney Todd…

_He was no longer willing to kill._

_**He. Sweeney Todd. **__Was no longer able to take a human life without so much as thinking about it. _

_Had he been planning to kill Beadle Connor?_

Distant, as if through thin walls, he heard voices, Anthony's familiar tone, and the constable's strange one.

"Stay back! Don't come any closer!"

"P-p-p-please…I…I s-swear, I mean you _no harm…"_

"Stay there! You're an officer, aren't you?"

"Y-yes, I'm with S-Scotland…S-S-Scotland Yard, but---"

"Then you're with Beadle Connor! Take another step nearer, make so much as _one noise…" _Anthony fumbled the razor from inside his coat and clumsily pulled it open with two hands, holding it out with the blade cocked at a harmless angle. "Take one step nearer, and I'll…I'll cut you to ribbons!"

"_P-please…be….quiet!" _

Sweeney blinked once, shaking himself, falling slowly back to earth.

_Maybe he had. Maybe his plan really had been to kill Beadle Connor all along. But even if it had been…_

_It didn't matter now. Because he couldn't do it anymore._

_He, Sweeney Todd, could no longer kill._

His eyes came back into focus and he jerked back to reality, surreally abandoning his impossible revelation and somehow finding the ability to leave its contemplation for another time. He looked into the young face of the constable. The razor had caught him beneath his right eye and left a long, ugly-looking laceration over his cheek bone. It was seeping blood, and would doubtless need stitches…but he was _alive, _he was perfectly alive. Sweeney was unable to comprehend, just at that moment, the unimaginable feeling of happiness that gave him. _It didn't matter if he was an officer or not…the boy was __**alive**__. Sweeney hadn't killed again._

"Who are you?" Sweeney suddenly demanded, lowering his eyes at the young man. The constable jumped nervously, hand pressing back over his wound, his mouth working soundlessly for a moment before he found the words. He spoke in a hushed whisper tripped with chronic stuttering.

"My n-name…my n-n-name is D-Daniel…Daniel Northing. I'm…yes, I…I _am _a member of B-b…of B-Beadle…C-Connor's bat-t-talion…but I'm not…I'm _not _like the others. I'm n-not…I'm not…I kn-know that what the Beadle is doing is…w-wrong."

Practically in unison, Sweeney, Anthony, and Toby's shoulders went slack in disbelief, their arms falling to their sides. Sweeney and Anthony glanced at each other, then back at the constable.

"Daniel Northing," Sweeney repeated blankly.

The boy nodded fiercely. "Y-yes sir. And you're…y-you're S-Sweeney…S-Sweeney Todd, aren't you?"

Sweeney stared, not knowing whether he should answer or not. For a moment, he was silent, his brain churning madly to try and sort out all that had just happened in the space of less than two minutes. Slowly, cautiously, he answered.

"Yes," he said quietly.

Daniel Northing looked as if he were on the verge of trembling, and he was continually swallowing in between words.

"M-Mr. T-Todd…ah…sir…I…I kn-know you don't have any…any good reason to t-t-_trust me, _but…but I want to help you. I want to help you g-get…get M-Mrs. L-L-Lovett _out of this…p-place."_

Sweeney stopped. For a second, one second of quiet, his heart stopped hammering. His eyes narrowed further. He took one step nearer to Daniel, who flinched and shook, but didn't retreat. He took another step closer. He walked until he was face to face with the young man. Daniel was a few inches taller than he was, but instead of tilting his head to look up at him, Sweeney lifted his eyes up to stare menacingly at him through his brow. The constable gulped loudly, but still refused to step back.

"Mrs. Lovett?" Sweeney whispered, his voice low and dark.

Daniel swallowed again. He nodded. "Y-yes, sir. I…I, you see…I was…the one to…t-take care of her, after…and…she, and I…I-I know Beadle C-Connor, sir, I know he's an…an evil man, and…and I---"

Sweeney's eyes widened and his brow narrowed. "After?" he asked, a terrifying quietness in his voice as something stirred deep in his chest. "After what?"

Daniel looked as if he were in danger of toppling backwards out of fear.

"After…a….a-after…."

Sweeney leaned even closer to him, and he took one stumbling step backwards.

"After _what?" _Sweeney whispered.

Daniel was pale and shaking. "The Beadle…he…he made her…c-c-confess."

Sweeney's glare froze on his face. He didn't move. He didn't flinch. A surge of flame, a slow, simmering rage began to well up deep inside him. Underneath it was the urge to scream. He held it down, and it built up like pressure, like steam. The razor was still in his hand. He was suddenly holding it so hard the pattern carved into the handles was imprinted like a brand in his palm.

_Confess._

_He made her confess._

With that single word, the decision over whether or not to trust Daniel Northing became, quite abruptly, a non-issue.

"Take me inside," Sweeney heard himself say. His voice was calm. For a moment, it felt like the detached puppet-work of Benjamin Barker…but immediately after, he knew it wasn't. Something was separating him from himself, a wall, a dam, holding between him and the well of blood-thirsty wrath flooding inside of him. A wall…keeping it from consuming him, keeping him sane, keeping him from breaking down the front door of the mansion and slitting as many throats as it took for him to find Beadle Connor and cut the black beating heart out of his chest and shove it down his throat with his bare hands.

_He made her __**confess.**_

One little word. And yet in it---in this city, in this _hole---_Sweeney knew, all imaginable horrors were possible.

_Nellie._

"B-but Mr. T-Todd…I…M-Mrs….M-Mrs. Lovett and I, we have a plan…we're to…"

"I said take me inside."

"But M-Mr. T-Todd, sir…"

Sweeney reached out and seized Daniel Northing by the neck of his clothes, holding the razor to his neck in a lightning-fast movement. Daniel immediately silenced, the whites of his eyes enormous as he stared tremblingly down at him. He would not have killed the boy---but at the same time, his moment of revelation, his shocking epiphany, had been instantly smothered by the fires of black, unspeakable rage.

_Nellie._

He was done. Just like that, he was done. Done running. Done hiding. Done with everything that had started the moment he had slit open the innocent throat of Charles Connor that gray, silent Monday in his barbershop so many, many lifetimes ago. Done with every horrible thing he'd caused, everything he'd done to himself, to his family…to _her._

_This was finished. It was going to end._

_**Now.**_

The flat side of the blade pressed hard into Daniel's throat.

"I _said," _Sweeney snarled in a whisper, seethed through clenched teeth, "_Take me inside."_

Beneath the rage was misery, a misery that wanted to scream. It too was held out by the wall between him and the burning bloodlust.

Swallowing, sweat beading on his brow, Daniel nodded fiercely.

"Y-y-y-yes….s-sir."

The blade immediately dropped.

"Daniel," Sweeney said quietly as he turned away from the young man, stepping past him and staring at the gaping stone fortress that was Judge Turpin's former home.

The constable shook as he answered. "Ye…y-yes, s-sir?"

"If I'm alive when this is over, remind me that I am indebted to you for the rest of my life."

Daniel's eyes widened and blinked in surprise. "Ah…y-yes, sir."

Anthony and Toby, who had stood listening in stunned silence, began to walk forward. Sweeney turned his head and shot them a look that would have turned water to ice. They froze in their tracks, watching him almost fearfully. He turned back to the mansion.

"Anthony. In five minutes, go to the back door. It will be open. Go in, take Johanna, and the two of you and Toby leave. It doesn't matter where you go. Just _leave._"

If he'd had nerves wrought out of iron, Anthony couldn't have argued with Sweeney's tone. He only closed his mouth finitely, nodded once.

"But…what…what about you, my friend? And Mrs---?"

"Do as I say," Sweeney cut him off.

Anthony shrank back obediently, and a silence as heavy as death fell over the small crowd standing in the shadows on the street corner. Sweeney's face was chiseled into a dark, emotional mask. His heart was stone. It had stopped thudding in his ears. Everything, for once, was simple and clear.

_He would get her back. And revelation or no, consequences be what they would---he would kill anyone who got between him and her. _

_So help me, God…_

_If he had to, he would do it. _

If it had to, the wall, the wall holding all of his rage, his wrath---the wrath, it seemed, not only of the last few minutes, the last few days, not even the last year…but the wrath of every day for sixteen years, the wrath that even murdering Judge Turpin had not satisfied---if it had to, the wall holding it inside of him would break.

_And God have mercy on anyone who was in his way when it did._

He turned to Daniel Northing, who started and looked back at him with his terrified---and yet somehow, at the same time, courageous---hazel eyes.

He spoke…and his voice was like the voice of death itself.

"_Let's go."_

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

Beadle Connor was in the study, slouching in an armchair, his mustache bristling furiously and his fingers drumming impatiently on the mahogany arm, when there came a calm, firm knock at the door.

He growled, storming to his feet and crossing the room with pounding steps.

"About bloody _time!" _he roared indignantly. "Now what's that _idiot_ Northing got to say for himse---"

He threw open the door, and stopped.

His arms dropped to his sides. His mouth hung open, silent, in mid-word.

In front of him stood Daniel Northing, his eyes wide and paralyzed with terror. A deep cut ran beneath his eye, blood congealing all down his face. An arm was around his neck, his hands gripping it for dear life as it held him in place. He was trembling like a leaf from head to toe.

Beadle Connor followed the arm. It's counterpart was holding a bloody razor pressed to Officer Northing's throat. Behind them were shoulders and a chest, vested in black, and just above that, an exposed throat that appeared as if it had been cut open and then stitched shut. Beadle Connor stared, blankly, as still and speechless as a statue.

A face, wreathed in a wild black mane with a single streak of white, stared straight at him over Daniel's shoulder. A face, as pale as death, two black, sunken eyes, like lifeless sockets, staring straight into his soul.

The face smiled at him. An evil smile that chilled him like a stab of ice.

The Beadle gaped.

Sweeney Todd simply smiled.

"Good evening," he said softly. "I believe we've met before."

For the first time, in quite a long time, Howard Connor could not think of a single thing to say.

A/N; Oh, how I love to wield the iron fist of cliffhangers ( evil grin ). Hope you're all not too mad at me! I promise I'll get chapter 31 out just as soon as I can…in the meantime, reviews make me smile!


	31. Chapter 31

A/N; Chapter 31! Woot! Sorry it took me a while…it was harder than I expected to work out the pacing in some of these scenes, and sadly the next chap may take me a little longer as well. But I'm not giving up if you aren't!

Disclaimer; I don't own Sweeney Todd, you don't own blah blah blah blah blah….you know the drill 0_^

Chapter 31

_What Will Happen…_

Alone, waiting, watching, shivering in the cold and the dark around the corner of the stone wall, crouched Toby. He stared without ceasing at the silent enormity of the House of Records, the massive heap of grey stone and lit windows. The tranquility of Bell Court was an omnipresence…so quiet, so calm, so complete, without so much as the distant clatter of a horse's hoof prints down to disturb it.

Toby swallowed thickly, his face set determinedly toward the building as he hid behind the wall. He kept his hand in the front of his jacket, his fingers clamped firmly around the razor. Nothing happened. No noises, no disturbances, no footsteps from behind. For what felt like hours, he simply sat there, waiting.

The longer he waited, the longer the eerie silence persevered, the more nervous he became. All the while his eyes were glued to the front entrance of the building, the entrance into which Mr. Todd and the young constable had disappeared. He glanced to the left, to the dark alleyway at the side of the building where Anthony had slipped away a few short minutes after, leaving Toby alone in the dark street.

_What could be happening inside those doors?_

Toby began to fidget. He moved his jaw anxiously, his mouth firmly shut…he opened and closed his fingers around the razor, he shuffled on his feet, he drew a circle in the light, powdery snow without looked down at it. He alternately moved his free hand between the flat stone of the wall and the sharp corner, back and forth. He blinked sharply every few seconds like clockwork. He had no idea how much time had passed, but it certainly felt like whatever was happening inside the mansion was taking forever.

_Dad…Mum…_

…_you'd better be alright…_

Something small and bright suddenly drifted through the air in front of his face, and he shook himself and looked up. It had started snowing…fat, feathery flakes, wafting down slowly from the pitch-black sky. They slowly settled over the streets and buildings, blanketing, muffling the world and somehow rendering it even more silent than before.

Toby wet his lips anxiously. It was too quiet, too still. His excesses of nervous energy were building up and up with each passing second. He rose to his feet and folded his arms in his jacket, turning and pacing slowly in a small circle, craning his head to look back around the corner every time he came near it.

Minutes passed. _Nothing. Still nothing._

He took his hands out and began tapping the sides of his thighs, alternating sides, back and forth. His pacing grew faster and less directional. He peered around the corner again, and for the first time, his eyes fell on the dark two-story carriage house that was adjoined to the mansion. He became abruptly still as he looked at it, the slow roots of a wild idea forming in his overwrought brain. His fingers twittered nervously on the stone.

_Mr. Todd had told them to leave the moment they had Johanna._

His eyebrows twitched decisively. He took a deep breath, exhaled, checked the streets in every direction twice---and set off at a silently, loping run down the street toward the carriage house.

_He'd said they had to leave. He didn't say __**how. **_

_If they had a carriage…if they could take it and hide someplace nearby, maybe…just maybe they could hold out long enough until Mr. Todd and Mrs. Lovett were out of the house, too….then they could all escape together…._

Toby's heart gave a brief clench as Mrs. Lovett's face passed through his mind.

"_I won't let them! I won't let them do nothin' to 'urt you, not in a million years!"_

_Mrs. Lovett's eyes filled with fresh tears. "Oh, darlin'…"_

"_I won't let them, mum! I won't let them 'urt you!"_

_I promised her, Dad…I promised her…_

Toby narrowed his eyes against the memory, sniffing only once and forcing himself to stay focused. Quickly, and quietly as he could, he crossed the street and stole around the corner to the large, closed double doors of the carriage house. Once there, he quickly pressed his back flat to the wall and waited.

Nothing happened.

He gave a long, hushed sigh of relief…then turned his sights on the doors.

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

Beadle Connor stood there, his mouth hanging open, his arms stiff at his sides, in complete silence for a full half-minute. Time seemed to stand still.

Sweeney didn't move, didn't speak again. He held the calm smile plastered on his face, his arm gripped hostilely around Daniel's neck---a bit of a challenge, considered the boy was significantly taller than he was---but the ungainly way that his forced him to lean unsteadily backwards served only to enhance the frightening, immediate candor of their position. The other hand held the razor, still stained with the young constable's blood, pressed closely into the skin of his neck.

For his part, Daniel was doing a marvelous job of pretending to be terrified.

_Perhaps it wasn't all that difficult._

Sweeney stared, unflinching, straight into Beadle Connor's stunned and speechless face. He didn't show the slightest trace of it in his expression or stature…but his mind was quietly boggling, grappling with the surrealistic fact that he was, at long last, standing face to face with the Beadle, with the man who in less than one full week had nearly destroyed everything he had left in life. Beadle Connor…the dark, faceless entity hovering over them, the evil omniscience, the plague of their existence…all in one instant, brought into the light, given a face again. _No. _He wouldn't let himself think about it. _He had to stick to the plan. _He couldn't let himself stop to contemplate the idea that the man who stood in front of him was the man who had hunted he and his family like dogs for the past week. That the man in front of him had held his own daughter and his innocent son-in-law as hostages and forced them to help him in his wicked enterprises. That the man in front of him had tried to take his son from him.

_That he was the man who had taken Mrs. Lovett from him. _

The word again flashed in his mind, red, like a searing of hot embers---_confess---_and again, the unspoken implications that it brought to his imagination filled him the nearly irrepressible urge to break something.

A dark seize of animalistic rage spasmed across Sweeney's face as his thoughts strayed into dark territory, flickering his calm smile into a wide eyed, seething glare of hatred. It threatened to break him, threatened to make him forget all reason, abandon the plan, and kill the Beadle in cold blood right then and there.

His fingers clenched around the razor, his throat swallowing dryly. The fire of wrath burned in his chest like acid.

_No._ He refused to break his concentration, refused to let himself think about it.

_Just follow the plan. Show no emotion. The Beadle wanted a heartless, cold-blooded murderer?_

_That's what he's going to get._

The change of Sweeney's face into a terrifying glare of hatred seemed to jolt the Beadle partially back into coherence. His mouth---Sweeney narrowed his eyes wonderingly, just for a moment, on the soiled bandage taped to one corner of it---began to work soundlessly, and after a few nonsensical jabbering motions, his voice finally issued out in a cracking, half-choked stammer.

"Mr….Mr. Todd. Yes, I…I do believe I remember you," he said, clearing his throat. He was obviously trying to sound gentile…witty and unsurprised. Trying, and failing.

Sweeney reigned in his surging anger and forcibly schooled his features again into a calm, dark smile. Daniel's hands gripped tighter into the arm clamped around his neck.

"The same, sir," he said quietly, slowly taking a step into the study, Daniel stumbling with him in several tiny shuffles.

The Beadle instantly backed away and knocked into an armchair. He wavered for a moment, then moved to stand behind it, gripping the high back with both hands. He cleared his throat again, blinking and swallowing several times. His posture had suddenly become significantly less perfect than before.

"Let us…ah…let us not doing anything _rash, _now, Mr. Todd," he said, a fraction of the steadiness returning to his voice.

In spite of himself, in spite of the burning, seething knowledge that somewhere in this house Mrs. Lovett was being held prisoner, the image of her alone and shackled quietly threatening to drive him mad…in spite of everything…he couldn't help but relish the shine of fear in Beadle's Connor's eyes, the almost imperceptible quiver in his voice. His smile widened broadly, amusedly.

_Some things never change, I suppose._

"Believe me, sir…I've no intention of making any rash decisions," he said, moving slowly, deliberately forward. The Beadle's fingers tightened just slightly into the chair back.

"Re…lease, Officer Northing, if you would…Mr. Todd," he said lowly. "Just release him, nice and gently, now, and you have…my word, as a gentleman, that no harm will come to you."

At that second, Sweeney was suddenly struck with inspiration. _Hell, if barbering didn't work out…perhaps he might find a career as an actor somewhere._

He widened his eyes gleefully at the Beadle, held his mouth open for a moment in smiling disbelief…then dropped his forehead down to rest on Daniel's shoulder, and laughed.

No, he didn't laugh. He cackled hysterically_. _The room fell silent around him, his manic laughter exploding through it like electricity, shattering the thin illusion of calm.

When he finally looked up, he had to stifle a second bout of laughter---real, honest laughter---when he saw the frightened expression on Beadle Connor's swiftly paling face.

_Focus. Don't lose focus._

"Oh, but my good sir," he hissed between lingering chuckles, smiling through his teeth and his wild eyes and inching, ever so slowly, closer and closer towards the Beadle. "If I were to do that, we'd miss out on all _sorts _of fun, now, wouldn't we?"

"Just…stay calm, Mr. Todd," the Beadle swallowed, slowly raising his hands and showing him his palms. "Don't get excited."

"But I'm as excited as could be already," Sweeney replied, pressing the blade as firmly as he could into Daniel's throat without breaking the skin. The young officer inhaled sharply, appropriately trembling. "Do you know _why, _Beadle Connor, _sir?"_

The Beadle narrowed his eyes, his brain clearly racing for a solution to the current situation. Evidently, the only plan he could conceive was to try and keep Sweeney talking.

"No…I don't. Would you be so kind…as to enlighten me?"

"With pleasure. I'm excited because you're going to do something for me."

The Beadle blinked, once, as if shuddering. "And…what is that?"

Sweeney grinned broadly.

"Whatever I say."

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

Alone, in the dark, Nellie sat with her eyes open.

The room was not a room so much as it was a cell. A warm, stuffy, airless wooden cell half the size of a broom closet. It had probably once _been _a broom closet.

It was pitch black. There was no light under the door, no keyhole for a single shaft to find its way through. The constable had unceremoniously dropped her inside, then closed her in, the sound of no less than three locks clicking shut lingering in her ears long after the noise had stopped…reverberating, like the ringing of church bells.

She in the corner with her back to the wall. Her legs were bent at awkward angles in the cramped space, her injured right shin pulsing with agonizing pain…but she scarcely noticed it. Nor did she notice the ache of her countless bruises, the dull sting of her cuts and scratches, the hopelessly tangled state of her wildly frizzy hair as it hung in pieces over her face, the torn neckline of her dress slipping carelessly over one shoulder. She didn't notice any of it.

Her eyes stared, open, blank, emptily, up at the black, invisible ceiling of her cell.

In the darkness, she saw Daniel Northing on the street corner, turning around slowly into the light of the lamppost. She saw the flash of Mr. Todd's arm and the instantaneous glint of his razor. She saw Daniel falling down backwards.

Over, and over, and over, and over again.

Her tears had run dry. Her face had become empty and calm, her thick lips only slightly parted in the complete absence of any recognizable emotion. She simply…had nothing left.

She closed her eyes. But it made no difference, because she saw the same things as when they had been open.

_Nothing left._

She couldn't even have the blissful relief of unconsciousness. Sleep refused to come. So she waited. Just waited…for what, she didn't know.

_Nothing left._

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

"Whatever I say," the madman whispered, his crazed smile searing through Beadle Connor's insides and turning them to water.

He was staring, open-mouthed, at the paralyzing scene in front of him, his mind desperately searching for something authoritative to say, when all of a sudden there were footsteps pounding on the stairs. His four remaining constables came stampeding into the room, clubs and pistols raised at the ready. Beadle Connor's eyes shot fully open and he was overtaken by a spasm of fear even greater than that caused by Sweeney Todd's black, soulless eyes. He lifted both hands toward the officers, palms out in a frantically halting gesture.

"_WAIT!" _he practically shrieked.

The policemen stopped, their raucous shouts suddenly silencing. They had congregated, like dogs in a pack, toward the left side of the room, ready to attack the moment they were in formation. In unison, they each turned to stare incredulously at Beadle Connor, who was at that moment simultaneously mortified over, and too frightened to be concerned with, the violent trembling that had seized his entire body.

"Sir, he's taken a _hostage!" _one of the constables protested rather pointlessly.

"I can SEE THAT, YOU BLITHERING IDIOTS!" the Beadle screamed, his fear manifesting in misdirected rage. "That's why you don't move unless I _tell you to move!!"_

The instant the constable's footsteps had sounded in the corridor, Sweeney Todd had darted to the right side of the room, whirling Daniel Northing in front of him to face the police squad as a human shield. He stood there now, his breath rushing haggardly, excitedly, between his still-grinning teeth, Officer Northing still clutched helplessly in his grasp. Beadle Connor's eyes darted back and forth between the wild-eyed madman and the dumbfounded constables. There was a long, horrible pause of discomfited silence.

Mr. Todd was the first to break it.

"Good evening, again, officers,"he smiled. "Kind of you to join us. I do appreciate your following my requests."

The Beadle blinked, comprehending for a moment before turning savagely to his officers.

"What _requests?" _he snarled quietly, his lip curling and mustache bristling.

One of the constables looked at him as he answered, breathless and defensive.

"We 'ad no _choice, _sir! 'E'd already taken Northing hostage! We…we were all waiting downstairs for 'im to come back with 'is report, when they… they come right through the bloody fucking _front door, _and the fucking _barking_ son of a bitch tells us that if anyone makes a move 'e'll slit the boy's throat before we've got off one round! Tells us to put our 'ands to the wall and count to an 'undred, says if 'e 'ears _one noise _before we're through, Northing's as good as dead!"

As the Beadle listened, a furious, shaking anger overtook him, combating against his paralyzing fear like a clash of thunder and lightning bottled inside his trembling shoulders. He turned a glaring, disbelieving eye back to the right side of the room.

"Mr. Todd," he said slowly, struggling not to lose all control. "I am going to ask you, forthrightly, as one man to another, to _please _listen to reason. I will give you one last chance. Release Officer Northing, _right now, _and I _promise…_you will not be harmed."

The black eyes shifted to look at him. Sweeney Todd said nothing…only smiled, the demented, crazed, unceasing smile of his. Watching him. Laughing at him, silently. _Mocking him._

And then, in one instant, all of Beadle Connor's fear was completely superseded by rage.A vein throbbed in his temple as he sank his fingers like claws again into the chair back, overcome by an hysterical hatred greater than any he had ever known.

Beadle Connor had hated a great number of people in his life---a _great _number indeed. But never, _never_…had anything caused him such hatred as he felt at that moment when he looked into Sweeney Todd's smiling face. _Nothing _had ever made him feel such resentment, such raw, unbridled loathing. Not the deans of admission to Oxford Law. Not his parents when they had cut off his inheritance and refused to help him pay his loans. Not the other officers of Scotland Yard, who had laughed at him and called him _Howard the Coward _when they thought his back was turned. Not even Mrs. Lovett when she'd stabbed him in the face with a pen. Not even his little brother Charles. _Charles_, who'd been accepted by the Oxford deans on his first application, the same day _he_ had failed to be admitted for the third time. Charles, who had become one of the most successful lawyers in London by the time he was only twenty-five. Who had been favored and spoiled by their mother, prided and loved best by their father---who, despite being the second son, had been given their father's amber ring, the older and twice as valuable of the family heirlooms.

_No…at that moment, his hatred for all of them paled in comparison to the odium that he felt when he looked at that calm, gleeful, hideous smile._

The slowly simmering fury, built up from a lifetime of shame and bitter misery, exploded out of Beadle Connor all in one ethereal moment as he leaned forward and spewed the words at Sweeney Todd---at _the smile---_one screaming syllable at a time.

"_WHO DO YOU THINK YOU ARE, TODD? JUST WHO THE FUCKING HELL DO YOU THINK YOU ARE?? DO YOU KNOW WHO I AM? I SAID DO YOU __**KNOW WHO I AM? **__DO YOU KNOW THE THINGS I COULD HAVE DONE TO YOU IF I WANTED?? YOU ARE NOT IN A POSITION TO REFUSE ME! YOU ARE OUTNUMBERED! YOU ARE BACKED INTO A CORNER! YOU CANNOT WIN, AND YOU CANNOT ESCAPE! MAKE ONE MOVE WITH THAT RAZOR, ONE SINGLE MOVE, AND SO HELP ME GOD, I WILL SHOOT YOU MYSELF! I WILL PUT A BULLET BETWEEN YOUR EYES, YOU SON OF A BITCH! DO YOU HEAR ME, TODD? __**SO HELP ME FUCKING GOD, **__I WILL KILL YOU __**MYSELF!!!"**_

As the wind was exhausted from Beadle Connor's lungs, his savage scream dwindled abruptly into haggard silence, his chest heaving wildly and the whites of his eyes burning across the room. His knuckles were white as snow as they clenched the chair back like the talons of a bird. For one stunned, stricken moment, all was silent. The four constables were frozen like statues as they gaped at the Beadle in a blank stupor, unable to so much as blink.

Revived of his breath, the Beadle also blinked. He stared at Sweeney Todd. He blinked again.

The smile hadn't so much as flinched.

"Well said, sir," Todd said quietly, quite warmly. "You're forgetting only one thing."

The Beadle's face went as still and blank as a piece of wood.

Todd turned his eyes---with a twisted, horrifying look that was almost something like affection---briefly at the side of Northing's face, then back.

"You're forgetting that putting a bullet between my eyes will---sadly---do nothing to make this man's dead body disappear."

The Beadle's mouth opened. His arms fell to his sides.

Todd nodded, slowly. He moved his mouth, silently forming the words, his face turned so that only the Beadle could see.

_You know. You know what will happen if this boy dies under your investigation. Under __**your **__orders. _

_Yes. You know what will happen._

The Beadle tried to speak. He couldn't. Nothing but a dead, muted gasp of breath escaped from his throat…and he realized that he had made the fatal, archetypal error of using his entire arsenal---every last ounce of his fury, his threats, his intimidation---all in one blast…and it had failed. And now, he had nothing.

Quieted, dulled, as if from far away, he heard the anxious voices of the four constables.

"What should we do sir?"

"Sir?"

"Sir, say something!_ SIR! _What are your orders??"

The Beadle's eyes narrowed in a mixture of disbelief and amazement, his head slowly shaking back and forth.

The pale face, and the gentle smile…they burned into his soul like the fingerprints of hellfire.

_Sweeney Todd._

This man…this creature, that until a few short weeks ago, he hadn't even known existed.

_Sweeney Todd._

It is unsure what the Beadle might have done, if he had known that the next thought to cross his mind had also once been uttered in almost exact similarity in the slowly dying consciousness of Jack Bonnegen.

_Sweeney Todd. I believe you are the devil._

One of the constables growled in anger and desperation, finally breaking from his frozen stance.

"Enough! Let's just kill the bastard and be done with it!!"

He lifted his revolver level with Todd's head, cocking it in his fingers. The sound echoed hollowly in Beadle Connor's ears.

Instantly, the razor flashed in Todd's hand, pressing further in, and Daniel Northing uttered a sharp, strangled cry of pain.

"NO!" the Beadle shrieked.

The constable paused, startled just long enough for Beadle Connor to cross the room, seize the gun from his hand, and club him across the face with it. It happened too quickly for anyone to stop or understand. The officer fell to the floor, knocking the others as he did and holding a hand to the temple where the pistol had struck him. Beadle Connor gripped the gun in his trembling hand, breathing rapidly. For a few seconds, no one moved. Then, the Beadle spun around to face Sweeney Todd, his chest heaving. He took a deep inhale, then shouted, in a tone of manic desperation,

"WHAT DO YOU WANT??"

Sweeney Todd answered in a voice as calm as if he were specifying what kind of bread he wanted to buy at a bakery.

"I want the officers to be stripped of their weapons and manacled together in this room. I want them gagged and blindfolded. I want them to be shut inside, and I don't want to see them again."

"_What?"_

"You're outta your bloody mind, you little---"

"_SHUT UP!" _the Beadle screamed over his shoulder, silencing them. He shot his eyes back to Todd. "Done!"

"I want you to throw that pistol to the other side of the room."

The Beadle turned and pitched the gun. It hit the crystal carafe sitting on a small table, shattering it to pieces in a bursting fountain of amber liquor.

"Done," he cried again, his voice breaking further and further with each passing second. "Anything you want, anything…name it. I'll do it. Just…don't…don't, do anything…_rash."_

Those silent words…_you know what will happen…_they had rendered everything else nonexistent. They had evaporated his thundering anger, his booming authority, his formerly tireless quest to arrest Sweeney Todd and bring him to what he called justice. In one moment it had all become meaningless and unimportant; he knew nothing now but the desperate, all-consuming instinct to save his own skin.

_You know what will happen._

There was a truth. A truth that since the beginning, Beadle Connor had known fully well deep within the labyrinth of his subconscious, but had never completely admitted to himself. A truth that had terrified him, lingered always at the back of his thoughts, a constant, nagging, agonizing unavoidability. At that moment, that truth was ripped into the open, exposed, laid bare, so that even in the darkest corners of his mind, he was unable to deny it any longer. And the truth was this.

_He had no hard evidence with which to convict Sweeney Todd of murder._

He had Mrs. Lovett's confession. That was it. The burning of their pie shop, his brother's ring found inside the smoldering skeleton of the building, the disappearances of Judge Turpin and Beadle Bamford…all of it was reasonable speculation at best. When it came right down to it, he had the confession, and nothing else. And if that didn't hold up under trial---which, nowadays, especially since the passing of Judge Turpin and the appointment of a new judge, seemed to be happening more and more frequently---if, somehow, they discovered that it wasn't actually Mrs. Lovett's signature, that she hadn't actually written it with her own hand…or if even _one _of the witnesses present, whether it be a constable, the clerk, or the self-righteous little upstart Daniel Northing…if even _one _of them were to come forward and testify that the confession had been forced…then there would be _nothing. _Absolutely nothing with which to convict either Eleanor Lovett or Sweeney Todd.

Not only that…_he _would be the one held responsible.

He had been on unsteady ground from the outset of the entire investigation…and yet he'd denied it from the beginning, refusing to admit to himself or anyone else the feeble grounds of his convictions. If he were to fail now, if he were to have come all this way, broken so many laws, only to come up completely empty-handed…there would be far, far graver things than merely his _dignity _on the line.

It had long since ceased to be a secret that the offices of Scotland Yard had run out of patience with Howard Connor. It had _never _been a secret that constables both loathed him and were terrified of working under him. There was no one he could trust, _no one. _No one who he was sure wouldn't rat him out if given half the chance.

If they found out that he had forged the signature on the confession…or even worse, if Daniel Northing---the devil take his pathetic soul, that _damned Daniel Northing!---_if he were to die---if he were to be _killed, _under Beadle Connor's watch…

_His mind flashed back to a single moment in time, years earlier…a screaming girl, a dark, smoking room…the report of a gunshot, the lifeless rolling of her eyes into the back of her head as blood flowed from the bullet-hole in her throat…_

He shook himself, forbidding the image, forbidding the memory.

If Daniel Northing were killed under his investigation, it wouldn't matter what else happened, or what the circumstances had been. Connor would be blamed. He'd be finished. More than finished. He would be…

_You know what will happen._

And here, at the bottom of everything, was Sweeney Todd. The man who was holding the razor…pressed against the pulsing life, against the very _future,_ of not one man, but two.

"You are going to surrender any weapons of your own," Todd continued, his voice remaining a flat, constant state of calm. His death grip around Northing's neck never flinched, never loosened, even for an instant. "You are going to keep with you one pair of manacles and the keys to them. First, we are going to unlock every door on the ground floor of this building. Then, you will take me to where you're keeping Johanna Hope. You will open her door, and you will loose any binds of cuffs you've placed on her. You will set her free, and leave her to find her way out on her own. Then…then…"

For one, passing instant, Todd's voice seemed to falter. A choking pause rippled through his words, a single second of hesitation…then it was gone. The Beadle blinked, narrowing his frightened eyes just the slightest bit, wondering if he'd really heard it or not…

Todd regained his composure in the blink of an eye, and lowered his face to stare burningly at the Beadle nearly through his brow.

"…then…you will take me to her."

The Beadle's throat, which had been constricted tensely in near-panic and the constant desire to swallow, suddenly went dry. A fist of hysterical fear closed shut around his heart, clenching it like a vice.

_Her. Mrs. Lovett. _

"…_I believe, Mrs. Lovett---for God only knows what reason---that his particular object of purpose, is __**you."**_

…_dear God….he was a fool, a __**fool, **__an unmitigated __**fool…**_

_What would Todd do when he saw…when he saw Mrs. Lovett, when he saw what had been done to her…??_

_Howard…you fucking fool…._

The Beadle's palms began to sweat. He was so paralyzed with dread of the dawning realization of what he'd done, of the corner he'd backed himself into, that he had to shake himself to force Todd's continuing words to register in his ears.

"You will take me to her. You will show me where she is, and you will give me the keys to open her door and unlock her restraints. Then, I am going to handcuff you in a room on the top floor, and I am going to leave. Once I have Mrs. Lovett, I will release the boy---_Northing, _did you say he was?---at the front door, and not a moment sooner. And if you make one false move, Connor…if you give me the wrong keys, if you tell me she's behind a door, and I find that she isn't…if you show the _slightest _indication of disobeying me…I will kill him. Him…and anyone else that I have to."

Beadle Connor trembled, sweating, as he listened. For perhaps the first time in his life, he simply listened….humbly, quietly, without a single thought or idea of his own to drown it out.

He was defeated. He was finished.

_He knew what would happen._

Beadle Connor slowly lowered his hands to his sides. He stood up perfectly straight, his palms facing Sweeney Todd and Daniel Northing, his eyes for once entirely vacant of malice, of anger, of intimidation, of superiority. For once, there was nothing in his eyes at all.

_Now and then, he could still hear them. Like echoes from the distant past. Their hearty, jovial voices as they stood on the street corner, as they congregated at Yard headquarters, as they sat atop their mounts, side by side, waiting for orders to depart. Whenever they thought he wasn't around._

"_You hear what that nasty prig from the Charring division did the other day?"_

"_Which nasty prig?"_

"_You know, Connor. That balding git, the one the Eastern precinct boys are always ribbing about."_

"_Ahhh, Howard the Coward? Ha, yes, I remember. What did he do?"_

"_Turned tail and ran from a mugger with a knife. Left the poor woman he was robbing high and dry, right in the middle of the street! Poor woman might have been killed if another Bobby wasn't just coming round the corner. But can you imagine? Just turned his ruddy yellow hide right around and ran, like a kid from a school fight!"_

"_Ha, you don't say! Ol' Howard the Coward. Miracle they haven't sacked his sorry ass."_

"_They certainly will, he ever pulls a stunt like that again."_

No…as he looked into the face of Sweeney Todd, there was nothing in Beadle Connor's eyes. Nothing at all. His voice was a broken, hollow shell.

"Whatever you want. It's yours. Just don't…do…anything…_rash."_

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

Anthony stared at the door.

His heart was pounding like a drum, his stomach overrun with butterflies, his fingers twitching restlessly at his sides as he stood there in the dark, brick alley, watching the door. He wet his lips repeatedly.

_Five minutes. _

_Five minutes, Sweeney had said._

Anthony heard a faint noise somewhere down the street and jumped violently, jerking his head to look down the alley towards the lampposts. He stood as still as a statue, eyes wide, pulse throbbing. No one passed. The night slipped back into tense silence.

He gave a long, slow exhale, and looked back at the door. _Should he be waiting here? What if someone were to come out? What if another constable were to come checking the perimeter?_

But he couldn't drag himself away. He stood, pulled like a magnet to the simple back door of the mansion, hidden beneath a little stone alcove with pillars. He swallowed thickly, his eyes boring into the gray wood, watching, waiting, mind racing.

_How long had it been since Mr. Todd had gone into the house?_

_Had it been five minutes? Less? More? _

_What should he do?_

Anthony turned and began pacing back and forth in front of the door, his arms folded tightly and his gaze never leaving it for long. His breath puffed out in nervous white clouds, his shoulders shrugging and his hands fidgeting as he absently, half-heartedly tried to warm himself up. His shoes tapped anxiously on the wet cobblestones.

_Had it been five minutes?_

He stopped, squaring himself with the door and taking a deep breath. Slowly, cautiously, he took a few steps toward it, his arm reaching out to take the handle, his hand trembling. He paused inches before the knob, then swiftly pulled back and retreated several feet back into the alley.

_Better wait. Better wait one more minute, just to be sure._

_Johanna…my dear Johanna…._

…_I'm coming….hold on, just a few moments more….we'll finally be together again…_

He turned and walked to the street, stood long enough to glance each way up and down Bell court, then turned and walked back. A fifteen second journey at best.

_Had it been another minute?_

_Better wait a bit more…just to be sure, just to be absolutely sure…._

He again walked to the street and back. Faster this time…perhaps about ten seconds.

_How long had it been now?_

_It had to have been five minutes by now, surely it had to have been…_

He folded his arms tighter, hugging himself anxiously.

_He couldn't wait any longer. He had to do it now._

_Johanna…_

Anthony stood up straight and pressed his mouth into a firm line, forcing his arms to hang calm and ready at his sides. He took a deep breath, and let it out slowly. He walked forward until his nose was inches from the wooden. He closed his eyes…exhaled again…opened them.

He slowly, slowly, _slowly…_lifted his hand to the doorknob.

The instant before his fingers closed around the handle, he heard voices.

From _inside._

Anthony froze, for one split-second, in sheer panic…then, with the speed and silence of a jack-rabbit in the snow, he turned and ran from the alcove, darting around the brick corner and throwing his back to it, hugging flat against it for dear life, his chest heaving and his heart racing.

A firm, jolting _click _echoed once through the empty alley, followed by a slow, gentle _creak _as the door was pushed open halfway.

"Ah…there…that's…that's the last one."

Anthony's eyes widened. _Beadle Connor…_

"Where are you keeping the girl?"

Anthony swallowed silently, his heart beating so fast he felt as if he might black out. _Mr. Todd…it was Mr. Todd…_

"The girl? The girl…yes…Miss Tur---I, I mean, Mrs. Hope…she's in a room on the second floor…"

"Take me to it. _Now."_

"Yes, of course…just as you say…nothing _rash, _now, nothing rash…"

Their voices abruptly began to fade away, Beadle Connor's stunted, frightened muttering and Mr. Todd's low, black growl of intimidation. Anthony waited until the sounds of their footsteps had vanished completely…he waited for what felt like an eternity, his heart pounding and his palms pressed into the brick behind him. He waited in the silence.

Then…he turned and looked around the corner. The door was hanging open.

He swallowed thickly, summoning up as much fortitude and courage as he could muster.

_He would wait. Long enough for them to go upstairs and release Johanna…then, he'd make his move. He'd get her back._

_Johanna…my love…_

…_**soon. **__I promise._

A/N; I wasn't planning on ending the chapter there, but the section coming up might be a little complicated, and rather than postpone updating for another half-week I decided to cap it off until next time. Hope you liked it! Reviews make me smile ( and also keep my spirits up in these trying times of multiple homework assignments )!


	32. Chapter 32

A/N; Aha! Finally, a good-old-fashioned eighteen-pager, so long and juicy you need to read it with a napkin! ^_^ Oh, and bonus fan-geek points to anyone who can find hidden in this chapter the title of the song from the musical that I strongly feel should have been included in the movie. Enjoy, everyone!

Disclaimer; I don't own Sweeney Todd. You don't own Sweeney Todd. But we _do, _thankfully, own napkins.

Chapter 32

_We Learn to Say…_

or

_Behind the Door_

They were smaller, narrower, than he would have expected…the hallways in Judge Turpin's mansion.

Somehow, in the innermost depths of his subconscious---though he had never quite realized it until that moment---he had always imagined the interior of the place where Lucy had been stolen away from him as being something like a nightmarish castle…a vast, empty cavern, lit with burning torches, filled with iron devices of torture and Gothic medieval furniture. But now…as he walked silently behind Beadle Connor through the winding corridors, Daniel tripping hastily in front of him, their combined footsteps scuffling loudly and nervously along the wooden floor…everything around him seemed claustrophobic and sad. The bare whitewashed walls seemed to run forever on either side of him like a monotonous sigh, unbroken save for the square, tasteless lamps and the dark, tightly shut wooden doors. It was nothing like he had imagined…and he felt certain, somehow, that even before it had been converted to the House of Records, it had been nothing like he imagined. The place was formal, business-like, and unhappy.

_No…this wasn't the place where Lucy had been taken from him. That place had been painted over and forgotten some time ago._

_Or maybe…that place had never existed. Maybe, at the very bottom of everything, Judge Turpin hadn't been the supreme being of unspeakable evil, the demon of limitless power, that Sweeney had once imagined him to be. Maybe this house wasn't the temple of all wickedness. Maybe, at the bottom of it all…Judge Turpin had been just another sick, horrible, guilty man in a sick, horrible, guilty world. And this place…this place was just another lonely collection of bricks and stone, lost amid the jagged sea of a thousand other rooftops exactly like it. _

A sharp, metallic jingling sound filled the hallway to the corners. Beadle Connor's pale hands gripped the ring of keys for dear life, jangling them with every violent tremble that coursed through his arms. The pair of manacles that Sweeney had ordered he bring along hung, draped from the chain, over his forearm…they swung back and forth like an iron noose as he walked.

Every few seconds, Beadle Connor would glance anxiously over his shoulder, his eyes timid and pathetic as if he were hoping against hope that once, when he turned around, Sweeney would no longer be there. Every time he looked, Sweeney made sure that their eyes met and that he seared the Beadle with a fresh, scathing glare and a wicked smile, and it would set the man shuddering all over again.

They reached the tall, arrow-straight wooden staircase, lined with an ornately carved mahogany banister---perhaps one of the only elements in the building, aside from the study, that was leftover from the judge's dynasty---and the Beadle hesitated at the bottom of it. He turned to peer meekly over his shoulder, swallowing.

"You…ah…you're quite certain you wouldn't rather wait down he---"

"Move_,_" Sweeney cut him off blankly.

The Beadle started and obediently ascended one step…then he paused again.

"You're _certain? _I could easily save you the trouble of---"

"_Move," _he repeated, this time snapping viciously and curling his lip in a tight sneer.

The Beadle swallowed audibly, his feet stubbornly---or perhaps fearfully---rooted to the first stair.

"It's not that…I mean…I don't mean to _question _you, Mr…Mr. Todd, it just seems troublesome for…um…for the young constable to be pushed about for so long like that---"

"_I said MOVE!" _

Fire flared up in his voice as he growled savagely. The Beadle's eyes were fixed fearfully on him, and Sweeney was suddenly gripped by paradoxical nervousness…by the urgency to prove how insane and bloodthirsty he was, how readily he would be willing to gut the boy like a fish. Panic spasmed through his fingers, and without stopping to think, he haphazardly nudged the blade into Daniel's skin. The second he did, Connor flinched and spun back around, cringing as he hastily began climbing the stairs.

"I'm moving! We're moving!"

But Sweeney didn't hear his simpering. He had frozen abruptly. A fist of cold horror gripped his heart and rocketed it into his mouth---_he had pressed too hard._ The young constable uttered a sharp, entirely unscripted gasp of pain as Sweeney, with uncharacteristic clumsiness, retracted the razor as fast as he possibly could.

It was nothing short of an act of Providence that the Beadle had turned his eyes away the instant before it happened---because the moment Daniel's subdued cry reached Sweeney's ears, his evil grin fell away like a mask torn from his face, replaced with a pale, blank expression of dread. A still tremor jerked through his body…he looked at his hand, and fresh blood was trickling down his finger. He froze in disbelieving horror.

_Daniel…oh God, what had he---? He hadn't…no…no, he couldn't have…._

For one horrible, extended moment, he was unable to move, unable to push the officer forward to climb the stairs after the Beadle. His arm trembled around Daniel's neck.

Mercifully, a few short seconds after, Daniel coughed loudly, swallowing, muttering in a hoarse voice.

"It's…it's alright, B-Beadle…Beadle C-Connor, sir, it's alright…just…j-just a scratch---"

The Beadle didn't so much as look back. He was halfway up the stairs.

Sweeney had to fight to keep himself from audibly bursting out with relief…the hand that held the razor trembled fearfully for an instant longer before he could force himself to relax and again regain his twisted mask of apathy.

He couldn't possibly speak to Daniel---he couldn't even risk looking him directly in the face. But before they ascended the first step, he loosened the arm around the boy's neck, ever so slightly, unclenched his hand, and laid it flat over Daniel's chest, his fingers clenching gently, desperately. For one fleeting instant, he held his hand pressed firmly over the boy's heart…then, without missing a beat, he again seized him in a grappling chokehold and pushed him violently onto the staircase. He could only hope that passing contact had gotten the message through.

_Forgive me, Daniel.…God….forgive me…._

_Don't you dare forget to remind me, if I live through this…_

_I owe you everything. I owe you my life…_

…_and hers._

Within seconds they were at the top of the staircase. The Beadle chuckled fallaciously, with a hollow clearing of his throat, his hands shaking loudly the keys and the manacles.

"Ah…ha…ah, h-here…here we are, just to the left…"

He went down a short corridor branching just off of the stairs, stopping at the first door on the left. Sweeney halted behind him, his eyes boring into the dark wood---all of a sudden, his heart was pounding. He kept his face chiseled in the wicked mask, refusing to let the smallest trace of feeling show through…but inside, there was a voice, whispering…desperate, broken…

_Johanna…my girl…my daughter, she's there, Todd, she's there…let me go to her…_

It was Barker.

Sweeney clenched his jaw, a stiff, cold numbness filling his entire body. _Johanna. _

Her name bombarded him in one staggering sweep, all at once, like torrent of rushing water…he had honestly not stopped to think of her, once, as anything more than a hostage and Anthony's wife, since the moment he'd set foot back in London. But now, as he was fully overcome by the realization that she was there, less than a breath away, waiting for him in the next room…

_His daughter, his only child, the only living piece of his beloved Lucy…the child he had not seen---not truly __**seen**__---in sixteen years…the child who had never known him, never seen his face or heard his voice save for one horrible minute when he had dragged her out of a trunk, pushed her into a chair, and smiled at the thought of slitting her thin throat…_

The back of Sweeney's eyes were assaulted by the most god-awful stinging sensation he had ever felt. At the moment when he most needed to be blank, most need to be stoic…he had never wanted to let his tears fall so badly. He couldn't. He held them back, burning, swimming…his face never broke, not even for an instant.

_You promised, Barker. Until she's safe with Anthony, and not a moment sooner._

_Johanna, _Barker was sobbing in his head, moaning softly…_Johanna…she's so close, Todd, please…you have to let me see her…please, I beg of you, just one moment…just let me touch her…_

"Miss---ah---M-Mrs. Hope, sir…just as you asked," Beadle Connor muttered obligingly, motioning to the closed door. "Her…ah…her old room, as a matter of fact…couldn't keep all of her things, of course, but…as far as a b-bed…a b-bed and a window, it's the nicest we have to offer here---"

"Open the door," Sweeney said blankly, a bit too quickly. The second the Beadle's back was turned he squeezed his eyes shut, screaming silently with the effort of keeping the storm shut inside…his teeth clenching so fiercely, it ached through to the top of his skull.

_Focus! Do not break! __**Do not break!**_

_She's not your daughter. She's Johanna __**Hope. **__You're just a murderer, just a heartless murderer…you don't care about her…do not act like you care…_

_She's just Johanna Hope._

_Do…not…__**break! **_

_Click._

The lock calmly, gently clicked open, and the Beadle fumblingly wrenched the key loose again. The door eased forward the smallest fraction, creaking softly before coming to a stop…then, it just hung there, a long, still crack of darkness running vertically between it and the frame.

Sweeney's heart pounded and his eyes burned behind the stoic mask.

Barker was silently weeping. Sweeney struggled to shut out the smothering cries echoing in his mind.

"Open it," he heard himself whisper. "Open it."

The Beadle glanced at him strangely, almost suspiciously, only for an instant, before reaching forward and pulling the door fully open. Sweeney glared threateningly at him.

"One move, Connor," he mumbled blankly, his eyes cold and black. "One move, and the boy dies."

The Beadle only swallowed, nodding obediently, the muscles in his jaw going taut as he stepped back to stand against the wall opposite from the door.

_Go! Go, Todd, she's there, she's right there! Let me go to her!!_

Sweeney fought back against the stinging as it grew sharper and sharper with each passing second.

_No. You're a madman….think like one. Act like one. Toy with them._

"Wait," he said coyly, turning his head toward the Beadle and forced a playfully fiendish smile that scorched him like fire to wear. "You first. Turn on the light."

The Beadle blanched, but obediently slunk through the door ahead of him. He disappeared for a moment into the blackness. Then, with the turn of the invisible knob, there was the sound of the gas rushing quietly in the still air…the golden glow of the lamps sprang up from nothingness, and the room was bathed in the dim light.

Benjamin wept. It was the only sound to break the complete quiet of the room.

Sweeney didn't so much as blink.

He slowly, casually stepped through the doorway, Daniel in tow.

There was nothing in the room save for a small bed dressed in plain white linens, a bedside table, and the lamps on the walls.

His gentle footsteps came to a stop beside the bed. His fingers were suddenly loose around the razor, his chokehold on Daniel not quite as severe. His shoulders lowered, and his lips parted. His expression did not change…but the light, the burning, stinging light behind his eyes, swam in the black orbs…a distant flash of silver and sadness.

He looked down at her. There she was…as plain and real as the bed she lay on, as the floor beneath their feet.

His daughter, whom he'd been absolutely certain---_twice_---that he would never see again.

_His baby._

_Johanna._

She was laying on her side, asleep, her face turned away from him. Her pale blue, long-sleeved gown billowed over her sprawling legs, her small feet, tucked in her blue shoes, peeping out just visibly from beneath the hem. Her frail shoulders rose and fell gently in time with her shallow breathing, her arms resting curled and limp in front of her…her long yellow hair fanned out over the pillow, the strands glinting in the light of the gas lamps.

_Like a waterfall of gold…exactly the way he remembered Lucy's_.

He couldn't see her face. He tried to call up the memory of that night…that night in his barbershop, and the frail, delicate boy he had almost killed. He tried to remember the face, the wide grey eyes that stared, terrified, into his….and discovered that, for the first time, he couldn't. No frightened face, no wide, frightened eyes…nothing. Nothing but his own reflection, glinting in the bloody razor.

_And are you beautiful, and pale, with yellow hair…like her?_

His eyes twitched. His heartbeat slowed to a steady rhythm.

Barker, for the moment, was silent.

Sweeney stared, unblinking, unmoving…unfeeling…at the delicate, sleeping form of his daughter. The daughter he had almost killed with his own hands, who saw his blood-stained face in her nightmares. The daughter who would never know who he was…who _her father was._

_And I'll never see Johanna…no, I'll never hug my girl to me…._

_He understood. There were some things he would never be able to tell them. Some things…he would never be able to do._

_Never._

His hands didn't move from Daniel's throat. And yet, at the same time, they were reaching out, yearning to hold her, to touch her…to stroke her soft, yellow hair…to see her face, to hear her voice, just once, not afraid or gasping or shuddering, but just…_her voice…_

_He couldn't. Not now…not ever._

_Wake up, Johanna….another bright red day…._

_We learn, Johanna, to say…goodbye._

_Goodbye._

_And forget my face._

He turned to Beadle Connor, who jumped under his gaze. He nodded gravely. He forced himself---the burning in his eyes stung like acid…there was a thick, heavy stillness filling his chest, suffocating him…but he swallowed the pain, swallowed the memories, and _forced himself---_to smile his calm, twisted smile.

"Very well, sir. Let us proceed."

Beadle Connor averted his eyes and swiftly turned to hurry out of the room like a frightened rabbit, the keys jingling as he went. Sweeney followed him, walking briskly away from the bed where Johanna quietly slept…so close, close enough for him to reach out and touch…and yet, too far for him to even see.

Barker was crying hysterically.

_NO! GO BACK! I beg of you, Sweeney Todd, I __**beg of you**__…just one touch! Just one! She's my daughter, Todd, my daughter…my only child…Johanna…our baby, Lucy, our little.…please, Todd, please!!_

_Just one…moment…_

Sweeney stepped back out into the hallway, pushing Daniel along. The two of them turned and followed behind the Beadle, down the corridor, away from the room…away from Johanna.

He didn't look back.

_Goodbye…Johanna._

In his heart…not in his eyes, but in his heart…the tears were falling.

Inside his head, Barker put his face in his hands, and became silent.

_Goodbye._

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

_In her dreams…she thought she heard a voice. _

_Too faint to be a memory…too vague to be anything more than a small inkblot in her subconscious…and yet, too real to be merely a fantasy._

_A voice…so quiet, so calm…whispering, as if in the middle of the night._

"_Oh, where's daddy's little girl?"_

_Such a gentle voice…deep, and soft, and dark…her cries quieted gradually as it came nearer to her, heavy footsteps on the floor, a tall figure through the bars of her crib…she felt herself calming, the nearer it came…the nearer he came…_

"_Where's my little dove?" _

_She rolled sleepily onto her back, tossing the blankets, looking up at the dangling, turning mobile of copper animals. The footsteps came to a stop just beside her crib._

"_Where's my Johanna?"_

_The face appeared over her. He smiled, his dark eyes shining in the faint moonlight that streamed through the window. She looked up at him, and she was calm._

Johanna's brow narrowed in her sleep, her hands closing into fists, a soft moan sounding between her closed lips. She rolled fitfully to her other side, burying her face in the pillow.

_He was there…the voice, the face…he was somewhere nearby, she was sure of it…she'd heard that voice before, heard those footsteps before…she wanted him to come back, wanted him to make her feel calm and safe again…_

Her eyes opened blearily, blinking, her head still swimming from the sedative. The colors blurred and moved in front of her, and she squinted, slowly sitting up, fighting her thick dizziness…

The lights were on. _Why were the lights on?_

_Where was he? In her dream…he'd been so close, she was sure that if she'd only open her eyes, he would be there…the face, the voice, the dark eyes…_

She looked around her. The room was empty. Her heart sank.

_I suppose…he was just a dream, after all._

She turned her head. She blinked.

The door to her room was open.

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

Anthony stood as still as a statue in the exact same position as the moment he'd seen the open door…hugging the brick corner, eyes fixed immovably forward, breath baited and hands shaking.

He counted the seconds…_one, one thousand, two, one thousand, three, one thousand, four…_until five additional minutes had passed.

The exact instant he reached _three hundred one thousand, _something inside of him burst, and his nerves shrugged away from him like water rolling off a duck's back. He sprang forward without a moment's further hesitation and bolted through the open door, plunging into the semi-darkness of a strange, empty hallway.

His heart was thudding in his ears, his breath was whistling rapidly through his lungs, and his eyes never ceased their constant movement, his ears perked, searching for the faintest hint of an approaching footstep…but he was not afraid. Not anymore.

_Johanna…I'm coming!_

He stopped when he reached the end of the hall, waiting until he was certain there was no one nearby. Cautiously, he peered around the corner…he was looking through a doorway that led to a dark, drab, dusty-looking kitchen lit only with the faint light from the gas lamps far down the hall.

_Yes…he knew where he was. The door he'd come through was the same door that Johanna had thrown him the key to, that bright, grey morning so very long ago…_

Softly, silently, putting his feet down at delicately as a cat's paws, he ventured forward into the hall. The dim glow of the lamps filtered down the walls and the floor, his hands cast in shadow as he held them cautiously at his sides to hold his balance as he tiptoed. _If he had just passed the kitchen…yes, he had to turn left at the end of the first hall and take the servants' staircase to the second floor. _

He would go to her old room, first. Rationally, the chances of their actually keeping her there seemed slim, but then…he had a feeling…nothing he could quite explain, just a _feeling…_like an invisible arm of her presence, reaching out, pulling him towards her.

_Her old room, first._

It seemed to take him an eternity to reach the staircase…he was toeing the floor so slowly and lightly that not even the most ancient of floorboards uttered a single groan beneath his weight. When he at last came upon the dark, ill-lit, he showed not even the slightest hesitation before plunging headfirst into the semi-blackness. The further he descended, take the stairs two at a time at the same snail's pace as before, the darker it became. He held both palms flat against the rough, white-washed walls of the narrow passage, feeling his way along, his breath hot and thick in the dusty closeness of the stairwell.

The doorway at the top of the stairs appeared before him in a glowing rectangle of light. His heart hammering in his mouth, his hands beginning to shake as they gently slipped away from the walls…he swallowed, blinking…and stepped into the light.

The walls had been stripped and washed barely, the ornate carpets taken from the floor, and the lamps replaced with square informal fixtures---but in his mind, it was _the hallway, _exactly as he remembered it…and he crept his way anxiously down it now, exactly the same way as he had that fateful morning. _The hallway…the door…_

He swallowed again. _The door to her room…it was open._

For a single instant, he stopped. His heart pounded twice.

"_Johanna!"_

All caution, all pretenses of silence and stealth, were in one motion wiped clean from his mind, the instant he saw her open door.

Anthony took off at a sprint down the remaining few feet of hallway, seizing the door in his hand and whirling around in, bolting into the room, crying out as he did…

"Johanna! Jo---"

His voice stopped dead as his footsteps pounded to a halt just inside the doorway.

She turned and looked at him. Her golden hair fell loosely over one shoulder. She narrowed her eyes, blinking sleepily.

"Anthony," she stated blankly. Not a question. Not even the smallest hint of surprise.

She smiled…and tears that hadn't been anywhere near to his eyes less than a second ago immediately sprang to life out of pure nothingness.

"You came," she smiled softly.

"JOHANNA!"

He was across the room in the blink of an eye. He crashed to his knees on the edge of the bed so forcefully it sank and groaned beneath him, the springs screeching in protest. He wasn't aware of himself seizing her in his arms, hugging her into his chest…he wasn't aware of his voice, calling out her name over and over as clear, watery buds of unshed tears congregated like dewdrops in his eyes…the only thing he knew was that she was _there. _She was real, she was solid…she wasn't a dream. He turned his head to bury his face deep in her soft, flowing hair---he pressed his mouth to her neck over and over, his eyes squeezed shut, the joyful ache of pent up sobbing nearly choking him. He rocked her back and forth, and she seemed to fold up as small as a doll in his embrace…she said nothing, but he felt her nuzzling gently into his neck, her little hands fisted in his clothes, the wetness of her tears dampening his skin.

For one moment…he didn't know how long…they just sat there, together.

He realized she was trembling. Soft, muffled cries struggled out from the fabric of his shoulder. He opened his mouth, and found that his own voice was stunted with the almost desperate urge to cry.

"Shhhhh," he whispered, squeezing her as tightly as he couldn't without crushing her in his arms…and still it wasn't tight enough. He wished their two bodies could fuse into one. "Shhhhh. I'm here. I'm here."

"You came for me," she cried, her small voice broken and laughing at once. "You came back…Anthony…"

"Shhh."

He turned, lifting his hand to cup the back of her head. He pressed a fevered kiss to her temple, a shudder rippling through his entire body. He couldn't hold her, couldn't feel her, couldn't smell her, enough to possibly satisfy him. He held his lips against her skin long after the force had dwindled from his skin. She sniffled loudly, jerking and burrowing deeper into his chest.

"You came for me," her voice was almost completely buried.

"_I'll always come for you," _he murmured against her forehead. _"Always."_

She cried harder, hiccupping and shaking. He pushed her head down beneath his chin and held his eyes closed as the tears he'd held in gathering buds in the corners of his eyes at last streamed down, clear and straight and fast. They rocked together, back and forth…gently.

Without realizing it he'd begun to whisper…his voice low, gentle, rhythmic…almost as if he were trying to sing.

"_I feel you…Johanna…I feel you…"_

"Kiss me."

He stopped. He looked down at her as she gently pulled back from his embrace, gripping his collar in both hands and looking up into his eyes. Her beautiful face was red and blotchy, streaked with tears, her lips full and trembling…but there was a light, a light gleaming in her eyes like the flicker of a candle's flame. With the light, she was smiling.

"Anthony," she whispered, her voice quivering with the tremulous ecstasy of a passion too long withheld, _"Kiss me."_

He didn't have to be told a third time.

Several deep, long minutes later, they parted, each gasping quickly for air…their gazes met, and Johanna's bleary eyes suddenly narrowed in a fierce, purposeful determination.

"Anthony," she said firmly, gripping his forearms in her hands, her voice hard and cold. "Before we leave..._there's something you and I have to find."_

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

If Sweeney had been unprepared…if it had shocked him, and nearly broken him, to see Johanna in the flesh….then there were no words to describe what would happen to him when he saw Mrs. Lovett.

Because the stinging behind his eyes became---in some inhumanly impossible way---ten times as relentless…only from looking at _the door._

_The __**door.**_

It sat there, simple, blank…_shut. _Three locks sealing it to the frame. Shallow scratches on the posts, as if from the clawing of fingernails.

The door.

It stared him straight in the eye. As if claiming to be innocent.

It bit into his pounding heart like a wooden stake.

_The __**door.**_

He heard the cold, hollow sound of his own voice murmuring in the corridor…but it wasn't he who was speaking. Nor was it Barker. It was the mask…the mask of his empty, blank expression. It took on a voice of its own and spoke for him, because at that moment, Sweeney was unable even to draw a breath as he stood, arms around Daniel as stiffly as a statue, _the door _stamped into the black mirrors of his eyes like the seal on a letter.

"She's inside," his mask said.

Beadle Connor nodded.

"Exactly as you asked…this is her ce---er…this is…her room."

The mask blinked.

"She's inside," it said again.

The Beadle's eyes slowly narrowed…and although Sweeney didn't see it---he couldn't see anything, anything apart from the flat shape of the door---there appeared, for the first time since his entrance into the study, a spark of true cognizance.

A spark of true _suspicion._

"Yes, Mr. Todd," he said shortly, his posture regaining a tilt of it's strictness, for some reason. "I give you my word…Mrs. Eleanor Lovett is inside this room, just as I've told you."

The mask was able to tear its thoughts away from the door as it looked at Beadle Connor. Sweeney was not.

_Mrs. Eleanor Lovett._

Her name seared like a scorching flame around his heart…his hand tightened involuntarily on the razor. If Daniel hadn't breathed heavily at that moment, drawing him back into reality…he shuddered, forcing himself to turn and walk away from the door. With every step his body took his heart screamed incredulously in protest, ordering him to turn around, to forget everything else and wrench that godforsaken door straight off its hinges.

But the mask held on. It stared forward down the empty corridor, not looking at Beadle Connor's face as it whispered the black, threatening words with terrifying calmness.

"If you're lying to me, Connor," it said quietly as it gazed blankly into nothingness. "I will kill you."

The Beadle's face blanched…the light of suspicion was snuffed out like a candle.

"You…you said before you would only…that you'd only k-kill the---!"

The mask swiveled and pierced him with his daggering eyes, and he froze in mid-sentence.

"The boy, I will only _kill. _You, Connor…I will kill _slowly."_

He leaned close…so close he could see the shadow of the bead of perspiration trickling down the Beadle's temple.

"_**Very. **__Slowly."_

The mask turned away.

"The third floor. Take me to an empty room."

The Beadle said nothing. His jaw worked soundlessly…sweat ran down his forehead in racing streams. His face was a damp sheet of white.

Without any thought at all, without an instant's warning…without looking back at him…Sweeney tore his right arm away from Daniel's throat and shoved the Beadle into the wall so forcefully the lamps trembled, their flames flickering and the glass shades rattling. His elbow digging into the Beadle's chest, he wrenched back his wrist to hold the blade of the razor poised an inch in front of his face. Connor cried out in alarm, his eyes crossing to stare in quivering, bloodshot terror at the stained, gleaming edge hovering like a silver snake just over his nose.

"I said. _Take me to an empty room."_

The Beadle showed no sign that he had heard, other than to swallow so loudly it almost echoed.

The instant Sweeney released him from the wall, he turned and set off down the hall practically at a run. He whirled around the corner so frantically he banged into it, the keys jingling in a symphony of terror.

The mask followed him without hesitation. Sweeney lingered, for one broken moment, on the door. _On what he would find when he opened it._

He wanted to speak. He wanted Daniel to say something…to tell him that she was alright. That she hadn't been hurt. But no one said anything…not even the mask. Together, they turned and climbed to the third floor, leaving the door and what waited for him inside it---for the moment---behind.

Even Benjamin Barker---as if in awe and reverence of something he had only within that instant come to understand---was respectfully silent.

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

Beadle Connor wheezed frantically as he reached the top of the stairs, stumbling to a halt on the third floor landing. Sweeney Todd's calm footsteps, accompanied by Northing's ever-present shuffling and audible wincing, were close behind him, and drawing closer.

A frenzy such as he had never felt had come over Howard Connor. He wasn't afraid, he wasn't angry. What he felt was not ascribable to any human emotion. What he felt was the primal, animalistic drive to save himself…not to preserve his position, not to arrest Sweeney Todd, not to salvage his ruined investigation and keep it from ending in total disaster…but only to _save his own miserable life. _For he was certain at this point that if Todd wasn't stopped, and _fast, _there was no way on God's earth that he would be leaving this building alive. He knew exactly what would happen…he could see it as clearly as a row of photographs, stamped in his mind in black and white. _Todd would handcuff him to something in the room on the third floor, probably slaughter Daniel Northing in front of him, just for fun, then go back down to the second floor, to her cell…he would open her door…and seconds later, he would be up the stairs again, reappear in the doorway, that horrible light burning in his eyes like the fires of hell, that blood-curdling snarl ripping between his teeth…that razor gleaming in his fist…_

_It was all over. It was all over unless he did something __**right now.**_

The sound of footsteps coming to a halt directly behind him at the top of the stairs sent shivers of ice running up the Beadle's spine. He spun around, backing away from Todd and Daniel so quickly he banged into the doorframe of the empty office room directly behind him.

Todd's face was as cold and empty as a porcelain mask as he casually jerked his head toward the doorway.

"Inside," he muttered, his voice flat and bored. _Bored…as if all of this was a game that he'd simply grown tired of…the monster, the inhuman monster…_

The Beadle edged backwards into the room, suddenly afraid to take his eyes off of Todd. His fingers clutched the ring of keys so tightly their jagged teeth bit through his skin…and still he gripped them tighter.

His brain raced. The back, pits, and collar of his formerly clean shirt were soaked with sweat, clinging to him like a wet skin. He began licking his lips repeatedly, cringing absently every time his tongue traced over the edge of the stab-wound at the corner of his mouth. He blinked, backing away from the madman and his hostage an inch at a time, watching them, nauseous with fear, as they slowly advanced toward him at the same pace.

_What could he do…what could he possibly…his time was up, it was over…he was as good as dead if he didn't do something now…NOW…_

For the smallest, fleeting fraction of a second, Howard Connor was distracted by an obscure, random thought. He wondered if it was possible, just possible…

…that he somehow deserved what was about to happen to him.

But he forgot the idea as swiftly as it came to him, because the very instant it did….something else happened. Something neither he nor Todd had been expecting.

One of the bare floorboards at the top of the landing had become badly warped. It was raised, less than a full two inches, above the others…as Todd and Northing moved forward from the top of the stairs…it happened. The smallest thing in the world…and yet, the very thing that would send a beam of blinding light bursting through Beadle Connor's dark, chaotic terror, that would sound a trumpet blast of the Hallelujah chorus surging through his desperate and cowardly soul.

Daniel Northingput his heel down on the exact edge of the raised floorboard. His foot slipped back with a staggering jerk, and his already precarious balance was thrown off entirely as he fell backward and to his left. He slipped out of Todd's grasp, and for a suspended instant, hovered, teetering, at the top of the tall staircase, a single breath away from tumbling down headfirst and backwards.

_It…_happened. And as Beadle Connor watched it happen, he smiled…because he knew how he could be saved. Everything was made clear to him, in one, illuminating instant.

His eyes widening, the razor deliberately dropping from his hand_…Sweeney Todd doubled back and caught Northing before he fell._

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

"Johanna…_we don't have time for this, _the Beadle could find us any minute---!"

"It's _here, _I'm telling you, it's in here _somewhere!"_

Anthony, panicking and pale, glanced up from the papers he was frantically clawing through. He swallowed thickly as he stared at the four policeman sitting in a circle on the floor in the corner of Judge Turpin's study, their hands bound together behind their backs, each one of them gagged and blindfolded. The blind tossing of their heads and their desperate, indistinct moans and wordless pleadings pricked the back of Anthony's neck with nervousness. True, even if they could somehow figure out how to get to their feet and move about the room as a unit, there was no way they would be able to make it through to door tied together like that…but still, their very presence was enough to make Anthony's heart pound and brow bead with faint perspiration.

He shoved the fruitless stack of papers off of the desk with an exasperated growl.

"We'll _never _find a single sheet of paper in all these files, Johanna! We _must leave, now!"_

"NO! I'm _not leaving _without that contract!"

Anthony groaned out in frustration as he began tearing madly through yet another book of legal documents, his eyes furiously scanning the titles. Johanna uttered a sharp, savage cry as she flung book after book off of the shelves, tossing them over her shoulders one after another. Loose pages were flying everywhere…torn and crinkled papers littered the floor.

"It's only money, Johanna! It's not worth risking our lives over!"

She didn't turn to look at him as she shouted incredulously, her delicate arms struggling to push an entire line of useless Encyclopedic volumes off of a shelf and search the space behind them.

"Don't you _understand, _you stupid---?? Anthony, that contract gives Scotland Yard the right to steal as much of the inheritance as they want, and they're going to _use it _to _find you, to find us both! _They're going to have us hunted down like dogs, and with Turpin's money, they'll be able to buy every judge and jury in London! They'll try us _both, _and they'll damn well get their money's worth! We _have to find it, Anthony!"_

Anthony's breath grew faster and faster, the futility of their search closing around him in a vice of panic…he constantly jerked his head toward the door, always expecting Beadle Connor to come storming in at any second…

_Mr. Todd…where in heaven's name can you be??_

"I FOUND IT!"

Anthony spun around, his heart racing…Johanna was beaming at him, her eyes wild and bright…she held up two papers in her hands, one crisp, white, and small, the other long, yellowed, and ancient-looking.

"I _found it! _The will, and the con---"

"_THEN LET'S GO!" _Anthony cried, cutting her off. He bolted across the room, seizing her by the wrist and dragging her behind him out of the study. The muffled sounds of the constables' gagged murmuring vanished swiftly behind them as they ran through the winding, narrow halls, no longer caring how much noise they made. On and on, around shadowy corners, through dark and endless corridors, until finally, the light of the still-open doorway was in front of them.

Like Dante breaking through the deepest circle of hell and bursting back into the daylight of the earth, they exploded out through the back door of the mansion and found themselves all at once standing in the quiet, brick alleyway. The streetlights were glowing softly nearby, the ground was blanketed in white and the snowflakes were drifting gently through the air. Everything was peaceful and silent, as if they escaped into another world.

They stood in the alley, panting and gripping each other's hands for dear life, for only an instant…then, they took off at a slipping, staggering run for the street. Two fleeing figures in the night, they ran across Bell Court, with not even the sound of their footsteps to break the quiet of the snow. They skidded to a stop around the corner, pressing their backs to the same wall that Anthony and the others had hidden behind earlier that night. Her chest heaving, her long hair fallen loose and hanging around her face in lopsided tendrils, Johanna gasped for breath as she looked down at the crumpled sheets of paper clenched fiercely in her hand. When she spoke, her voice was hoarse and weak.

"We're free, Anthony," she whispered in sudden amazement. "We're…we're _free!"_

But Anthony was turned away from her, gazing back at the Hall of Records, a dark dread sinking deep inside him.

_Where was Mr. Todd? Where was Toby? He was supposed to be waiting for them here…_

_Something was wrong._

"Johanna," he whispered, reached back to take her in his arms, but never turning his face away from the towering specter of the mansion…the prison, that somewhere deep inside of, his friend was still trapped. "We can't leave yet."

She returned his embrace, wrapping her arms around him and holding her cheek over his heart as she too looked on at the fortress of windows and stone.

"Mrs. Lovett," she cried suddenly, her voice catching and her arms tightening around him. "Mrs. Lovett…Anthony, she saved me…she's still inside…"

_Mrs. Lovett….Toby….Mr. Todd…._

Anthony swallowed. He fought to be strong, fought to keep his head clear, to be brave for Johanna…but even as they stood together, the snow falling softly around them, fear was closing around him like a fist, and his mind immediately began to run through all of the horrible things that could have happened to his friends. _They couldn't leave…they couldn't leave without Toby, without Sweeney and Mrs. Lovett…._

_What could they do? What could they __**do??**_

_Mr. Todd….what on earth is going on in there?_

_-_0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

Sweeney clenched his teeth, breath puffing erratically through them, his entire body tensing with effort…for one time-stopping moment, he and Daniel leaned back over the steep drop of the stairwell, hovering off balance, ready to pitch down at any second…

With a final burst of effort and a ragged growl, Sweeney threw all of his weight forward, and the two of them at last regained their footing on the landing, staggering forward and breaking apart. Sweeney's heart raced, the adrenaline pumping through him in intense, throbbing surges. His chest heaved. He looked up.

Beadle Connor was smiling.

Sweeney froze. The world seemed to stop turning as the realization of what he had just done slowly sank in, parting his lips in stunned speechlessness, widening his eyes and paralyzing his limbs. Daniel stood beside him, equally as rigid, his skin swiftly paling beneath the smears of dried blood on his face and neck. His eyes darted back and forth between Sweeney and the Beadle, as if asking frantically what he should do.

_Move! MOVE! _Sweeney's brain screamed hysterically at his body.

No one moved.

For one moment that felt like an eternity, the three of them just stood there, stock still, watching each other---Daniel desperately pleading, Beadle Connor silently grinning, and Sweeney…

…Sweeney, in that instant, saw Mrs. Lovett's face.

The Beadle lifted one hand and stroked thoughtfully at his chin. When he spoke, he was transformed…his voice had returned to its cool, calm, condescending purr…he smiled as he spoke, and the evil light gleamed in his steel-like gaze.

"Why, Mr. Todd…I do believe you just went out of your way to save Officer Northing from suffering a _very _serious injury."

_MOVE! MOVE! __**MOVE, GOD DAMN IT, GET THE RAZOR!!**_

His body refused to respond. He only stared, mouth open, his limbs rooted to the spot. Beadle Connor took a single, moseying step forward.

"I do believe, Mr. Todd, that you never intended to harm Officer Northing _at all."_

Daniel, in the corner of Sweeney's eye, exploded into action. He threw himself at Beadle Connor like a pouncing tiger.

"_GO!" _he screamed, almost in midair.

His hands collided with Beadle Connor's shoulders with such impact that both of them crashed into the open door, banging it into the wall with a deafening sound of crunching plaster. They toppled to the floor, wrestling violently, the whites of Beadle Connor's eyes burning like flames in the golden glow of the lamps. A soft _chink-chink _echoed in Sweeney's ears…the ring of keys had dropped onto the floorboards.

"MR. TODD, _GO! _DON'T WORRY ABOUT ME!"

_Daniel…Daniel, no…_

"WHAT ARE YOU _WAITING FOR?? TAKE MRS. LOVETT, AND __**GET OUT OF HERE!" **_Daniel's voice thundered off the walls, broken by grunts and struggling gasps as he and the Beadle thrashed against each other, rolling on the floor.

_Mrs. Lovett._

_**Nellie.**_

Sweeney blinked…and the world started again.

_Daniel…_

He couldn't bring himself to even think the words _thank you. Thank you _could never even come close.

In the blink of an eye he had seized the ring of keys and the razor…in a flash of lightning, he was running down the stairs, tearing wildly around the corner, his heart throbbing in his mouth. He didn't look back at Daniel and the Beadle. He didn't think, didn't feel…he simply ran.

Before he had even fully realized what was happening, the sounds of the two men fighting upstairs had faded into silence far at the opposite wing of the mansion, and he was standing, once more, in front of the door.

In front of _her door._

He had no time to stop…no time for the slightest hesitation.

With furiously fast, violently trembling hands, he flipped the keys to the brass, mid-sized skeleton that he had watched the Beadle insert into each of the three locks to prove to him that it fit.

The sounds of the key jerking clumsily in and out of each lock rang in his ears like church bells, crying, screaming out to him.

The final lock clicked open. He threw down the keys with a jingling crash.

He didn't hesitate, even for an instant.

He seized the handle of the door and threw it open. It slammed into the wall, banging and shuddering.

And then...everything became still.

A/N; I admit that I am evil, and that I get an unholy jolly from leaving you all dangling off the edge of a cliff. Feel free to smack me around all you want by reviewing!


	33. Chapter 33

A/N; Whew! Chapter 33, kids! I know I've been kind of a tyrant with the cliffhangers lately, so I did my very best to get it finished by today…and now I'm exhausted! Hope you like it!

Disclaimer; I don't own Sweeney Todd. You don't own Sweeney Todd……………….I got nothin.

Chapter 33

…_And She Was Beautiful_

Toby forced himself to breathe steadily, calmly, as he mounted the driver's seat of the hansom-cab-style carriage, the reins clutched fiercely in one small fist and a riding whip held in the other.

As he settled nervously into the high seat, looking over the roof of the little cab and the disinterestedly twitching back and tossing head of the big black mare he'd hitched to it, he silently thanked God, for the very first time, for the years he'd spent traveling the country with Signor Pirelli. If Pirelli hadn't taken him from the workhouse and driven him like a slave, packing and unpacking his caravan every time they came to a new village or town, he might never have known how to hitch and bridle a horse.

The small, empty carriage house, lit only by the few lanterns he was able to find hanging on the long rows of pegs, seemed suddenly even more silent than it had been a moment ago. The sounds of the other horses snuffling and pawing in their stalls fazed quietly into the background. Toby resettled is fingers around the reins, the leather creaking quietly---he swallowed anxiously, instinctively feeling as if he should straighten his posture.

_True, living with Pirelli had forced him to learn how to properly __**hitch **__a horse….but this would be the first time that he'd ever actually __**driven **__one…_

Toby swallowed again, taking a deep breath, his eyes fixed ahead at the double doors of the carriage house, opened wide into the snowy street. The world outside was suddenly much more black and ominous than it had been when he came in.

_You can do this…come on, don't be daft, you've seen Pirelli do this a thousand times…it's simple._

_Think of Mum, and Dad…they're waiting for you, don't just sit here like a coward! There's nothing to it at all…_

…_just…pluck up, and __**do it.**_

Toby clenched his teeth, ordering himself not to flinch…he slowly raised the whip high over his head, his fingers resettling around it three times…when the moment came, without meaning to, he squeezed his eyes shut and yelled, his small voice shattering the dull silence of the stalls and setting more than one horse to shrill, startled whinnying.

"YAHH!"

_CRACK!_

The whip snapped like a lightning bolt in the air, the reins jerking awkwardly in Toby's short arms. The black mare, who half a second ago had exhibited less pep and liveliness than the hay she was standing in, threw her head back with a ear-splitting cry, stamping her front hooves and jolting forward so sharply Toby threw back in the seat, nearly toppling out over the back.

"_Whoa!!"_

The carriage picked up speed the moment it was through the doors…the horse took off at a half-canter, snorting as the hansom careened behind her in a sharp left turn down the empty street. The wooden wheels skidded dangerously on the slippery snow and ice, the driver's seat thrown so far to the right that Toby cried out in shock, dropped the riding whip, and clutched the railing for dear life until the coach had again righted itself.

"_Slow down! __**Slow down!"**_

The horse, unsurprisingly, ignored him.

His heart pounding with adrenaline, Toby frantically fumbled to regain hold of the reins, yanking them taught the second he found his grip. The black mare shrieked in protest as her neck jammed uncomfortably backward…she veered wildly off to the right, headed straight for the corner of Bell Court and the intersecting street, the solid iron body of the lamppost rushing toward them.

"AAAHH!"

Toby wrenched the reins to the side with all his might, shutting his eyes the second before they were about to collide…he heard the horse's high-pitched scream, the manic skidding off hooves and wheels, the clattering of metal and leather harnessing, and then…

_CRUNCH!_

His eyes shot open, the whole body of the carriage jolting and jerking beneath him, shaking like a bull trying to buck him off. Splinters of wood flew past him, narrowly missing his face and eyes…he flinched away as the hansom side-swiped the lamppost, gauging it deep with an earsplitting wooden screech, the two left wheels lifting off the ground and swerving three feet in the air.

_THUD! _Toby was jolted again as they at last pulled free of the iron post, the wheels falling back to the cobblestones with a rattling crash. The coach fishtailed dangerously for one terrifying instant, threatening to overturn---Toby's heart hammered in his mouth, he'd not taken a breath since the instant they burst out of the carriage house---then, finally, the world righted itself again. The horse, shaken, but still cognizant, slowed to a swift trot, each wheel at last planted firmly in its correct position as they slid rapidly through the snow, leaving behind them neat dark lines racing through the white. The hansom clattered on in a straight line down the street, the half-silence of the crash's aftermath deafening in Toby's ears.

For a moment, Toby stared forward, stunned and gasping for breath, the reins slack in his hands.

After a suspended minute of blank, desperate searching, he found his voice again…_carefully, _he pulled the reins tight in his hands, calling out hollowly, breathlessly, _"Whoa!!"_

The mare whinnied briefly, and her hooves slowed to a gentle walk…then, at long last, they came to a complete stop at the corner, the abused hansom creaking to a halt and everything slipping into total silence in one instant.

Toby's chest heaved in erratic, subdued panting. The mare snorted indignantly, white puffs of air steaming through her flared nostrils.

Snowflakes landed on his eyelashes…he blinked them away, and in doing so managed to regain his hold on reality.

Immediately, Toby whirled around in the seat, throwing his gaze in every direction up and down the intersection…he waited, palms sweating around the leather, heart pounding wildly. He waited a full minute…nothing happened. He closed his eyes and heaved a long, heavy sigh of relief.

_People round here must sleep with their heads in the sand…_

It took nearly four minutes of summoning his courage for Toby to tremblingly lift up the reins again. Slowly, so gently they didn't even snap…he rolled the reins in a calm, cautious movement. They grazed the horse's back with as much force as a butterfly landing, but it was just enough. The mare obediently moved forward at a slow, plodding walk, her metal shoes clunking heavily, muffled to a dull _thud-thud, thud-thud, thud-thud _in the freshly fallen snow.

Toby drew in a long, steadying inhale, letting it linger in his still jumpy chest for an extra few seconds before issuing it slowly out through his rounded mouth. With equal if not double the prudence he'd used to start the mare up again, he ever so tenderly coaxed her to the right, nudging the reins with a few short tugs. The carriage turned, very widely, but successfully, to the right, and they continued down, smack in the middle of the street---they were parallel to Bell Court, now, separated by only one block of buildings and fenced in shrubbery. Toby kept his eyes constantly on the road in front of them, his ears perked and listening for the slightest sounds of disturbance or---_God forbid---_the approach of another carriage for him to have to maneuver around. He firmed his grip on the reins, leaning forward in the driver's seat and pursing his lips in concentration.

_He would go around to the same corner where Dad had told him to wait…certainly they must have been able to rescue Mum and Johanna by now. Maybe they were there, that very moment, waiting for him, wondering where he was…it would be perfect, he'd ride right up alongside them, and they could all escape together…they'd finally, __**finally **__be free…_

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

Anthony and Johanna were waiting, hidden around the corner of the stone wall, their arms wrapped around each other, when the thick silence of the night was suddenly broken by the abrupt sound of hoof beats and the creaking of a carriage nearby.

Anthony jumped when he heard it, instinctively tightening his hold on Johanna and pressing her closer to him. His eyes widened, his body going perfectly rigid as he listened for a split second to the heart-pounding noise…it seemed to have materialized out of nowhere, he hadn't even heard it approaching…

"Anthony, where is it coming from?"

"Shhh," he cut her off, his eyes narrowing in thought. "I think it may be---"

_**CRASH!!**_

The two of them cried out simultaneously in shock as a deafening, blood-curdling _crunch _echoed through the still air, the sound of splitting wood ringing through Bell Court in a brief, rupturing refrain Anthony's hands flew up to cover Johanna's head, his neck swiveling back around the corner, his eyes wide. As quickly as they'd been ripped apart, the streets mended back into silent tranquility again. There was nothing there.

Her chest heaving excitedly, Johanna peered out over his shoulder.

"What is it??"

"There's…nothing," Anthony muttered confusedly, turning back to her. Then, his ears perked up, and he lifted his face to the dark sky. "Johanna…do you hear that?" he whispered.

They huddled together, listening, the snow collecting slowly in their hair and on their clothes.

After a long, anxious moment, they looked at each other. It was faint and gentle, but the sounds of the coach rumbling down the street were coming from somewhere not too far off.

"It's moving," Johanna whispered, her wide grey eyes animated and questioning.

Anthony shook his head, refusing to let himself panic.

"I'm…I'm sure it's no one," he answered, gazing nervously over her head even as he spoke, scanning the lamp-lit street. "Probably just someone out for a drive."

They stood stock still for several minutes, listening intently to the distant noise.

"It's coming this way," Johanna murmured hollowly, holding Anthony tighter.

"Shhhh. Don't worry, we're not doing anything…we're just waiting here by the bench, that's all…just a young couple out for an evening stroll."

"But Anthony…what if it's the police?"

He opened his mouth to answer, but stopped dead, his eyes widening as he watched the dark, hooded shape of a mid-sized hansom suddenly turn around the corner at the far end of the street, pulled casually along by a single black mare.

"Anthony?" Johanna jerked her head around and stifled a sharp gasp. She whirled back, her eyes wide and frightened. "Run!! Anthony, we've got to run!"

"We can't! They've already seen us!" he hissed, his eyes narrowing fearfully at the carriage as it drew ever closer to where they stood. The shape of the cabbie hunched over in the driving seat was silhouetted in black by the streetlights behind him. He quickly turned himself and Johanna so that their backs faced the street, their heads turned to the wall and their faces hidden.

"_What do we do?" _Johanna cried faintly beneath her breath.

"Nothing. We're not doing anything wrong…they have no reason to suspect us. Just stand here quietly, and they…they'll pass us right by…"

_Clop. Clop. Clop. _The horses' hooves plodding through the snow, the rattling creak of the carriage wheels, closer and closer, closer and closer…

Johanna suddenly lifted her face, the flashing spark of an idea jolting behind her parted lips.

"Anthony, _kiss me!"_

He looked at her incredulously. "_Now!?_"

"We won't look suspicious if we're kissing!"

"But Joha---"

She cut him off with her lips, seizing his head in her hands and passionately devouring his mouth. Anthony's heart pounded, his pulse racing in anxious anticipation as the coach drew up directly beside them…he stared at it wildly in the corner of his eye for one instant, then threw himself in abandonment into her touch, closing his eyes tightly. _God…just let them keep going…_

The noises of the horse and the creaking of the wheels suddenly stopped. Silence permeated the air in a heavy, ominous shroud.

Anthony squeezed his eyes shut tighter and wrapped his arms around Johanna's waist, kissing her as if it were the last kiss he might ever get.

_Please…__**please**__……_

"Anthony?"

He stopped. His eyes shot open.

With a faint, abrupt sucking noise he pulled away from Johanna's lips, his jaw descending and his eyes squinting to peer at the cabbie's face. _That voice…it was…?_

His shocked face turned into a speechless half-smile as Johanna also turned around to stare in disbelief at the short little figure gripping the reins of the hansom.

Anthony blinked. _"Toby??"_

The boy wasted no time, offered not the slightest explanation.

"Where are the others?" he demanded desperately. "Where's mum and Mr. Todd??"

Anthony's smile vanished…his voice was instantly grave and shaking. "They're still inside."

Toby froze. For a moment of suspended silence, the three of them simply looked at each other.

"What…what do we do now?" Johanna asked, her voice small and hollow.

Anthony swallowed the lump that had jumped into his throat, steeling his eyes forward and setting his jaw. "There's nothing else we can do."

Toby looked at him pleadingly, his eyes frightened and wide. Anthony looked back at him, swallowing again, forcing as much courage and comfort as he could into his words and his gaze.

"There's nothing we can do…but wait."

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

Daniel's teeth were clenched, the veins and tendons in his wrists stretching taut and protruding through the skin as his arms trembled and his body shook. His knuckles were white as they grappled against Beadle Connor's hands, their fingernails digging into each other. Daniel kneeled over the Beadle, his breath rushing in and out in issued bursts…a single bead of sweat rolled down the side of his face. His vision was starting to grow fuzzy, his head getting thick and dizzy. _How much blood had he lost? _He was exhausted…his muscles screamed at him with every exertion, every struggling cry and gasp he uttered was one step closer to his collapse…

_Can't give up…can't give up…_

Beadle Connor glared up at him, seething, writhing with fury, a full circle of white visible around his steel-colored irises. His face behind the blonde mustache was as red as a slab of raw meat.

"_RrrrrAAAUUUGHHH!"_

With a snarling, ragged shout, the Beadle heaved against Daniel's arms and pushed a foot flat into his stomach, throwing him off of him. Daniel hit the floor hard on his side, instantly rolling away and staggering to his feet. The second he turned around, his eyes widened and he tried to back away, but it was too late…the heel of the Beadle's boot came flying straight toward him, kicking him in the chest and sending him flying through the open doorway and into the empty room. He landed on the floor, flat on his back, mouth open, lungs paralyzed and gasping for air.

A furious growl and a second violent _thud _told him that the Beadle had also fallen off balance and hit the floor…but in seconds, he was up again. Still unable to draw a breath, but refusing to stay down, Daniel rolled to his hands and knees just in time to dodge to the side as Beadle Connor leapt at him. The two of them met again, wrestling and grappling, two thrashing fusions of arms and legs and burning eyes, rolling and snarling in futility as they kicked and swung. All sense of time disappeared. Daniel didn't know if they had been fighting for thirty seconds, or thirty minutes….but somewhere, amid the mindless, primal mutterings of rage and incoherent pain, he heard one ragged strain of words escape the Beadle's bared and gnashing teeth.

"You…_TRAITOR! _You bloody…fucking…I'll see you _HANGED for this…AUUGH!!"_

The Beadle gasped and groaned as Daniel's fist finally found contact with the side of his head, his knuckle digging into the soft flesh of his ear. They rolled and broke apart, the Beadle curling into a ball on the floor and holding his head. Panting wildly, his vision swimming, Daniel scrambled to his feet, arms held at the ready. He waited until Beadle Connor had turned to stand up, then kicked him in the gut. Flecks of spit spray from his mouth as Connor doubled over again, squeezing his eyes shut, paralyzed in staggering pain. Daniel backed away, his face pale and frightened, his chest heaving. Slowly, the Beadle tried to rise to his hands and knees…Daniel clenched his teeth, stepped forward, and kicked him again---this time, in the chest, and with such force that his body flipped over to lay sprawled on his other side. The Beadle convulsed once more, guttural, inhuman noises gurgling from the back of his throat…then, all of a sudden, he lay absolutely still.

Daniel blinked. He stood there, panting, his hands shaking uncontrollably.

He stared down at the Beadle's back, at the slow, small trickle of blood running from inside his ear and staining his white, sweat-soaked collar. Connor wasn't moving. He wasn't breathing.

Daniel's heart pounded, his stomach turned, overcome suddenly with a crippling feeling of nausea, like he wanted desperately to be sick right there…his face twisted into a grimace of horror and fear.

_Had he…he couldn't have, no…could he…?_

"Beadle…C-Connor?" he whispered hoarsely.

Slowly, warily, he inched closer to the still body lying turned away from him. Connor's face was hidden.

"B-Beadle…C-C-Connor?" he repeated, his voice trembling.

Nothing. Not even a twitch.

Daniel stood over the Beadle's body, a horrible numbness filling his limbs. He swallowed over and over, his throat dry and scratchy. His face was ghostly pale, his hair mussed and glistening with sweat.

_Could he really…honestly…be dead?_

Daniel took one step closer, leaning forward over the body, his jaw quivering. He wet his lips and drew a trembling breath.

"Beadle…_Connor?"_

Silence.

Then…

It happened in the blink of an eye, so fast Daniel didn't even have time to gasp. One instant Beadle Connor was lying on the floor, as still as death…the next, he had jerked around, his mouth clamped shut and twisted in a grimace of a suppressed scream, his eyes squinted into slits. His arm shot forward and up like an arrow released from a bow, and with the force of a jaw-cracking punch his balled fist struck Daniel squarely in the groin.

For an instant, he felt nothing. His mouth opened and his eyes widened, staring unseeingly forward, as the fist retracted from below his belt…there was an almost ethereal moment of silent numbness. And then…a black, blinding swell of pain---a pain so hard, so intense, his mouth watered and stars blazed behind his eyes---shot in a crippling surge up from his groin, coursing through every limb and tip of his body down to his fingertips. He tried to groan, and discovered that his voice was gone. His body rigid, his eyes blank and unseeing, he collapsed to the floor.

Beadle Connor was over him instantly. Daniel felt only dimly as the revolver was yanked fiercely out of the holster at his hip…he heard from far away the jingling of manacles. He was being dragged across the floor, limp and stiff at the same time…he felt the cool press of the manacles around his wrists as his arms were bound behind him. He blinked, his face stricken in a blank expression of relentless, unyielding pain, a pain worse than any he'd ever felt. Dazedly, he pulled at his manacles…they were shackled around a thin metal pipe, a gas line running along the floor molding…he was cuffed to the wall, unable to even roll to his other side.

The last thing he heard before a wave of blissful unconsciousness overtook him was the pounding of heavy footsteps running from the room, and the gentle _snick _of a pistol being cocked.

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

_The final lock clicked open. He threw down the keys with a jingling crash._

_He didn't hesitate, even for an instant. _

_He seized the handle of the door and threw it open. It slammed into the wall, banging and shuddering._

_And then, everything became still._

For a brief moment after he opened the door, Sweeney's vision seemed to go dark. Blackness swam in front of him, and he blinked, trying to clear it away. It faded slowly, like a burn, and left him lightheaded.

He stared down through the open door. The room inside was not a room at all…it was nothing more than a hole, dark, wooden hole, barely large enough for one person to fit inside of.

He stared down at her.

The fingers of his left hand slowly uncurled, and the razor slipped from his grasp. It clattered to the floor, skidding a few feet away. He didn't look at it. The sound rang dead and hollow in his ears.

He stared.

Nellie's eyes were closed.

With that single glimpse…the glimpse of her eyes, _closed…_he forgot the Beadle. He forgot Daniel, forgot that they were fighting upstairs. He forgot where he was. He forgot Anthony and Johanna and Toby. He forgot to breathe.

He heard something hard bang into the wooden floor, and a numb jolt coursed through his legs and up his torso. It wasn't until he saw that her eyes…_her closed eyes…_were almost level with his that he realized he had dropped down onto his knees.

He kneeled in the doorway. His arms hung down still and heavy at his sides. His face…his eyes…his parted mouth, his deadened throat…he couldn't feel anything. He looked at her with an expression that in a mirror, would have appeared to be sorrow…but inside, it was more than that. It was the visual embodiment of a heart broken with horror.

He stared at her.

Nellie sat with her back to the wall, her head rolling onto her shoulder, her arms and legs a careless, tangled heap. Her eyes were closed, her face blank. Her wild hair---he had never quite noticed before, just how it was…dark, and red, with a shine like copper when it caught the light, bright and deep all at once---it hung loose over her shoulders, over half of her face.

_Nellie._

_I'm here. _

_I've come back again._

_Nellie…_

He moved his mouth, tried to say her name, but there was no sound.

He realized his hands were hovering over her, his palm trembling inches over her face, her neck, her body. He wanted to touch her, burned to hold her, to feel her real and warm and solid in his arms…something held him back, a pale, shaking sensation that was too great to be called fear. His throat suddenly ached. His face twisted further with pain…soft gasping sounds escaped his lips…the sounds of a pain too sudden and overpowering to understand.

_He stared at her._

She was covered everywhere with bruises. The worst was a purple, almost hand-print shaped mark mottling the entire right half of her face. Scratches and jagged cuts ran up and down her arms, over her chest and neck, on her forehead…traces of dried blood lingered in too many places to count. He heard something rattling, scratching gently…he glanced to the right as saw that it was his hand, gripping the frame of the doorway and trembling so violently his nails dug and bit into the wood. He tried to swallow and couldn't. His other hand still hovered, desperately, yearning to touch her, but an invisible shield of fear held him back…he was certain that if he so much as touched her she would slip away, like a spray of mist in the darkness.

Her clothes were ragged and torn in too many places to count. He trailed his eyes down her body, the dark, unrecognizable pain swelling further and further inside him…he was terrified. _Terrified, _as he had never been before in his life. Terrified because he didn't know what to do, because he couldn't remember who he was or what he was here for. He only knew that she was there, and that she had been hurt…and that it was his fault.

_His fault._

He heard someone gasping, sobbing dryly, choked noises of despair from the bottom of an aching throat. It was him. He felt like his stomach had been turned to lead, his heart into wood.

_Nellie…I'm here, _he tried to whisper. _It's alright now. I'm here._

It wasn't alright. Her eyes were closed.

_Nellie…_

And then he saw her leg. It was bandaged from ankle to knee, propped at a jarring, unnatural angle away from her body. It had been stripped of its stocking. It, and the shredded skirt around it, were completely saturated with blood.

_Daniel was pale and shaking. "The Beadle…he…he made her…c-c-confess."_

_He made her confess._

Sweeney's hands stopped shaking. The quiet sounds of confused, disbelieving sobs silenced in his throat. He began to breath again. His teeth clenched, not quite shut, air rushing in and out through the narrow space between them. His vision began to darken a second time…but now, it was darkened with red.

He looked at her face…her soft, still, battered face…her ruined clothes, her ruined bloodstained body…

A twisting pang clenched around his heart, and the pain…it was so horrible, so unbelievably cruel, as to actually choose this moment, when she lay there silent and broken in front of him, to make him realize the truth.

_She was beautiful._

_She was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen._

He was overcome. Energy hummed in his thundering heart, vibrated in his tensed muscles. He wanted to break something. He wanted to destroy whatever came into his path.

He wanted to _kill. _

Sweeney staggered to his feet, blind with inhuman rage. His nostrils flared, his body quaked, his chest heaved so violently that his breath was audible, haggard, rushing in and out, in and out…

He turned his head. The first thing that came into his line of vision was one of the square glass lamps set just above eye-level into the wall.

He punched it.

The shatter was immediate. The glow of the flame flickered and vanished instantly in a wisp of smoke…the glass exploded into a hundred jagged shards, scattering into the corridor like bits of diamond shrapnel…the brass frame wrenched out of the wall, ripping chips of white paint after it and sailed fifteen feet down the hallway, landed with a sharp, skidding crash before coming to rest in a cracked heap against in the far corner. The place where he stood was suddenly incrementally darker.

Sweeney didn't feel the shards of glass lodged between his knuckles, didn't feel the instantaneous trickles of blood running down his fingers and dripping on the floor. He didn't see the wall or the lights or the ruined socket of the lamp. He only saw her…pale, bruised, and broken, as the breath rushed through his teeth and his eyes burned into the floor…._only her…Nellie…_

_And…he saw Beadle Connor._

_Squirming…as he slowly pushed the blunt end of the razor into his eyes, his nose, his ears, the sides of his face…bleeding, screaming, dying slowly…as slowly and horribly as it was humanly possible for him to make it…_

Sweeney opened his mouth and roared. He lifted his arm and punched the wall, his knuckles cracking and the glass driving further and further in between the bones. He snarled and punched it again. And still, all he could see, was her face…her bruised, bleeding face…

_He had done this. He had done all of this._

_If he hadn't killed Charles Connor…none of this would have happened. It was his fault._

He slammed both fists into the wall, and held them there, his shoulders hunched and his head hung low, his hair falling raggedly over his eyes.

Slowly, he slid down until he was on his knees again. His right fist left a trail of blood smeared in a straight line down the whitewash.

He held his eyes shut, and his voice came forth in a miserable, guttural cry.

"Nellie."

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

"Nellie."

She narrowed her brow.

_Her name…it sounded so small. So sad._

It wasn't that that had woken her up. Other noises had come to her first, from far away, on the other side of the wall of unconsciousness…crashes, deafening shatters, had stirred her from sleep, but it was that simple sound…_Nellie…_that made her open her eyes.

Her lids fluttered heavily, slowly easing open…then immediately squinting back into narrow slits, her eyes watering as the light burned them painfully.

_The light?_

_Why was it light?_

Her door was wide open, the light from the lamps in the hallway dim, but still bright enough to make her blink and slowly lift her hand to shield her eyes from it. She peered forward, her lips parting in wonder.

_That was..._

_That was Mr. Todd kneeling there._

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

He heard a faint shuffling sound coming from behind him. His eyes shot open. A voice…weak, and faint, and all but broken…but oh, a voice that he had waited so long to hear…

"Mr. T?"

He straightened up and turned around. Nellie was sitting upright, tendrils of hair spilling over her face as she blinked groggily in the dim light.

Sweeney's mouth opened and hung there silently.

For one endless, silent---beautiful---moment…she simply squinted at him. His heart felt as if it had soared straight up and out of his chest.

"Mr. T," she said softly, sternly, her voice hoarse and far away…. "You shouldn' 'ave come 'ere."

He didn't say a word.

He went to the doorway on his knees. He leaned forward, wrapped his arms around her waist, and buried his face in her neck.

Nellie started lightly, drawing in a sharp gasp of air…he felt her heart jump to life, pounding hard and loud just beneath him. Her chin lowered into the crown of his hair…her fingertips traced incredulously along his temple, as if to ask him in ways that words could not…

_What?_

Sweeney closed his eyes and inhaled. He hadn't known what he was doing until it had already happened. He tightened his arms around her waist, dying inside with a happiness that he could not have understood if he tried. He reveled in the solid, heavy feel of her small body in his arms…the firmness of her bones, the structure of her delicate frame. He pressed his forehead into her neck, his face resting over her clavicle…the dirty feeling of her tacky, blood-dried skin was more wonderful than any silk or satin could ever be. He inhaled deeply, holding her as tight against him as his awkward, side-seated position would allow.

Briefly…just briefly…he let himself nuzzle against her.

_The last invisible wall around his heart had crumbled. Quietly._

He felt her hands, questioning and gentle, resting on his back.

"Mr…Mr. T," she stammered, breathless, hollow, as if the world had just been pulled out from under her feet. "Mr. T…what's…what's got into you??"

Sweeney lifted his face from her chest, slowly slipping his arms out from around her and straightening up, looking her straight in the eye. _Her eyes…the deepest brown he'd ever seen…they were open, glinting with that soft, mad, brilliant glow that had been in them since the moment he'd met her, and yet, that he'd never fully realized, until that moment._

He had meant to say them…the words. The three words.

But when he listened to himself speak, his voice soft, blank, and toneless, without even the frailest hint of a question...it was not those three small words that heard.

"Nellie. Will you marry me."

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

Nellie looked into his face. His pale, wicked, beautiful face…his dark eyes, gazing straight into hers. There was no one else there. There was no picture of Lucy, no flowered memory or forgotten morning of sunlight. It was just him…and her. He was looking right at her.

Tears filled her eyes and ran down her cheeks. She smiled…just a little.

_God must be a cruel, cruel person._

She sniffed, smiling wider, sadder…letting herself lean back against the wall again. His still, emotionless face didn't turn away…his shining black eyes didn't blink.

She laughed quietly, briefly.

"Alright, Mr. T."

No change passed across his face…except for the faintest imaginable parting of his lips, and...and…something else, in his eyes, that she couldn't identify.

Nellie smiled broadly, her heart aching and roaring in mocking laughter at the same time. More tears spilled from her eyes, and she chuckled, louder this time, nodding briskly.

"Alright, Mr. T…let's get married. Let's 'ave us a lovely big weddin', in a grand little church by the sea, with pretty stained windows and big bunches of roses, all in pink and white…"

Her voice began to break up with a mixture of sobs and laughter, and as she looked at him the strange light in his eyes vanished, and his face changed…and the change in it only made her cry and laugh harder.

"An' you in a brand new suit, and me in the most gorgeous big bloody white frock you ever did see, _trains _an' _trains_ of white, and lace up to my bloody eyeballs…and diamond rings and seagulls and castles in the sand, an' at night we'll dance out under all the stars and you'll look at me and you'll tell me you love more an' anythin' else in the 'ole world, and we'll get old an' stupid an' then we'll die. Jus' you an' me. Let's do it then, let's get to the sea! Let's you an' I get _married_, Mr. T!"

She burst into a riot of cold, miserable laughter, the tears running from her eyes in two thin streams.

Mr. Todd stared at her with a strange look on his face. She racked her brains for a moment before remembering where she'd seen that look before, and then it came to her…it was the way he had looked the moment that she told him Lucy had poisoned herself.

She smirked, turning her head away from him, squeezing her eyes shut and giggling horribly.

_That would be the face she'd imagine on him, wouldn't it. She'd never have any of his looks for herself…the most she'd ever be able to do was steal the faces he'd had for Lucy._

Nellie snorted, wiping her eyes…and the next minute, her laughing degenerated into nothing but soft, broken sobs…she closed her eyes and cried softly, her shoulders shaking. She suddenly felt a rough, warm hand cupping her cheek, the pad of a thumb tracing gently beneath one eye.

"Nellie," he said quietly. He sounded…lost.

She smiled through her tears, lifting her own hand to hold his closer.

"Oh, that's nice Mr. T…say it again, won' you?"

She opened her bleary eyes, looking at him, her smile widening and her heart aching at the horrible expression of sadness and confusion writ in his face. His deep, black eyes stared at her, searching her, as if they were on the verge of breaking. She sniffled loudly.

"Say it again, won' you Mr. T? Say my name again, jus' once more…before I wake up."

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

He stopped. His heart skipped a beat. The lost look of disbelief dropped from his face, and was replaced by a quiet yet---almost joyful---kind of desperation.

"Nellie," he whispered, leaning close to her, holding her face in both hands. Blood smudged lightly on her cheek from his right hand…but he ignored the three shards of glass sticking out of it. He barely even saw them. "Nellie…you're not dreaming."

She closed her teary eyes, giggling, snorting delicately.

"No, o' course not. I'm wide awake. Wouldn' be asleep at my own _wedding, _would I?"

"Nellie, you're not asleep. This isn't a dream."

She stopped laughing. The miserable smile dropped from her face, replaced by a sudden blankness.

She narrowed her eyes, her lips closing, breathing hard through her nose.

"Say it again," she whispered under her breath, fervently…almost angrily.

His eyes had suddenly begun to burn.

"Nellie," he whispered, and discovered that his voice was breaking up, choking in his throat.

She shook her head violently, reaching up and pulling his hands away…but keeping her fingers locked around his wrists.

"Say it again. Fucking say it again."

"_Nellie."_

"No!" she cried suddenly, breaking into angry sobs. "Mr. Todd wouldn' call me that…he wouldn---"

"What can I do?" he asked desperately, his eyes soft and pleading. "What will make you believe me?"

Nellie's eyes flashed at him wildly, her chest rising and falling with growing speed…her gaze darted down to his wrists, still clutched in her hand. She stared down at them for one still, heart-pounding moment.

Sweeney's eyes widened suddenly as he understood. "_No---"_

But before he could stop her, she took the back of her right hand and dragged it over his knuckles, over the protruding shards of glass. He flinched, not from the pain in his own hand, but from the gentle _rip _of her skin as she gouged it, her lips pursed firmly in determination.

Slowly, she let go of his wrists. He stared into her face, not knowing what to do.

She gently turned her hand to look at it. Her mouth relaxed and her eyelids fell half-closed as she stared down at it. A long, thin cut ran from the tip of her knuckle to the curve of her wrist. As they both watched it, a single line of blood pooled and trickled down.

For what felt like a long, long moment…they were both silent.

When she finally looked up at him, her lips were trembling, her eyes sparkling with tears.

"Sweeney," she cried softly. "Am I awake?"

He didn't speak. He didn't nod. He couldn't make himself move.

Her voice was quaking, her wide, brown eyes shining as if with the reflection of stars.

"Sweeney. Did you kill 'im? Did you kill Daniel?"

He narrowed his eyes and bit his lip. He shook his head.

"No." His voice cracked.

She sniffed, swallowing. "'E's…'e's really alright?"

Sweeney nodded.

"What about Toby? Where's Toby?"

"He's safe."

Nellie's lips pursed shut, the tears running from her eyes in crystal streaks.

"Mr. Todd."

His eyes burned, and he realized that he wanted to cry.

"Sweeney."

His hand crept slowly up her arm.

"Are you…are you really 'ere, love?"

He nodded.

"I'm here. I've come to take you home."

She closed her eyes and whispered.

"Ask me again."

His face was inches away from hers, his eyes half-lidded, shining and black and bathed with unshed tears the moment. Their foreheads gently touched, his hand holding the back of her neck.

"Nellie. Marry me."

She burst into soft, shaking sobs.

"I love you. I love you Mr. Todd. Oh, you great…s-stupid…coming 'ere…why didn' you stay away, why didn't you stay the ruddy, stupid…b-bloody…Mr. Todd…I love you, I've loved since the first day I knew you..."

"Nellie," he repeated quietly, darkly…their lips waited, her breath warm and close against his, "…marry me."

She sobbed louder, so close that her tears traced onto his skin.

"Of course I will, you great…oh…of _course_ I will…why the _bloody stupid _'ell did you come 'ere, you useless!…you…oh, of course I'll marry you, Sweeney, of course I---"

"Nellie."

She sniffed, struggling to control her trembling sobs. Her arms had moved to hold around his neck.

"What…" she sniffed; "What…what is it, love?"

He closed his eyes.

"Be quiet."

Their lips met...and her breath faded away into his.

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

Nellie's heart was pounding, bursting with the desire to cry. She wanted to cry and cry and cry and cry, until she had no strength left to cry with. She pulled Sweeney's face closer, drawing him deeper and deeper into the kiss until he actually stumbled forward, falling half on top of her, and still she wanted him deeper. His hand slid up the back of her neck and buried in her hair…he tilted his face to one side and delved into her mouth, his lips gentle…so gentle, she would never have believed…

The tears ran from her eyes inexhaustibly. She sobbed quietly into Sweeney's mouth, the sounds muffled into faint nothings. Slowly, languishing in the press of her thick lips, he pulled away…he tasted the corner of her mouth, trailed up to the skin beneath her eye, not so much kissing the tears away as he was holding his mouth closed over them until they faded. She sniffed awkwardly, smiling and laughing weakly. He held his forehead gently against hers, the backs of his fingers brushing softy down her neck to rest in between her shoulder blades.

Neither of them said a word. There was nothing to describe the impossibility of what had just happened…and yet…it had _happened._

"Sweeney," she whispered, leaning into him, his arms moved to hold her, her face falling down to rest beneath his jaw. "Sweeney…before we leave…there's somethin' I'd like to do."

He didn't answer with words. He gently brushed the loose tendrils of hair from her face, pressing the corner of his mouth to her forehead. She felt herself all of a sudden overcome with sleepiness.

"Before we leave…I've got to say thank you…to Daniel…"

Sweeney froze. He went rigid as stone beneath her.

Her eyes slowly lifted open. She leaned back to look at him. "Sweeney?"

It was as if someone had snapped their fingers and replaced him with a different man. Gone was the gentle touch, the caressing warmth, the eyes soft and black as a warm summer night…in one instant, with one word, he was again the glaring, ice-edged Mr. Todd who shuddered under her touch and turned awkwardly away from her smiles…the Mr. Todd who knew nothing, who _was _nothing---but his single driving purpose.

She blinked. "Sweeney?"

He turned to her, and his burning gaze sent a chill through her body.

"Can you stand?" he demanded, the gentle lull vanished abruptly from his voice. He spoke in a low, raspy growl of urgency.

His black, desperate gaze jolted through her…and suddenly she realized what he had, and her jaw nearly dropped.

_How could they…in the middle of…what sort of __**fools **__had they become?? They were sitting there in the middle of the House of Records, with Beadle Connor lurking God knew where, and there they were…doing…in the bloody middle of…!!_

Something that she had been missing…something that had slipped away from her some time ago, and that she had been lost without…came rushing back to her all at once with one sharp, glistening glance of Mr. Todd's eyes.

_Her practicality._

"_Nellie. Marry me."_

She wanted to melt. She wanted never to move from that spot, never to leave the warmth of his kisses…the kisses she had reminded herself a thousand times that she would never know.

But she couldn't. Not now.

_Practicality._

"No," she answered quickly, shaking her head. "Ruddy bastard put a bullet in the right one…can't so much as lift up on it."

Sweeney blinked, a spasm of shock, closely followed by burning rage, shooting through his face.

"He…_what??"_

"No sense gettin' worked up over it now!" she snapped, hurriedly bracing herself on his shoulders. "Jus' 'elp me up, and we'll talk about it la---"

She cut off into a sharp yelp of surprise as Sweeney abruptly slipped his arms underneath her and swept her in one rapid, fluid motion off the floor. She quickly hugged around his neck as he teetered backwards slightly before regaining his balance.

"Mind, _mind!" _she cried sharply, wincing as her bad leg bobbed once up and down, twinges of pain shooting through her shin. Sweeney said nothing, only hoisting her closer against him and turning to hold her lengthwise along the narrow hallway.

And suddenly…out of nowhere…

Nellie's eyes widened and she jerked her head to look over Sweeney's shoulder. A sound…_pounding…running…_

Her heart dropped into her stomach.

Time seemed to move in slow motion, the thundering sound of footsteps growing closer and closer…and then, like the movements of a nightmare…she saw him come around the corner, arms pumping as he ran.

Beadle Connor's eyes widened when they came into view…but he didn't slow down. He looked as if he had known exactly where they were going to be.

_Time slowed down._

Nellie gripped Mr. Todd's shoulders, her fingers digging into him as she opened her mouth and screamed.

Beadle Connor lifted his arm to point at them as he ran…his hand was clutched around the handle of a gun, his finger poised on the trigger.

Nellie was screaming long before the sound ever reached his ears. _It was as if time had slowed down._

"_**LOOK OUT!!!**__"_

_PPPSSSSIIINNNGGG!!_

Sweeney spun his head around as a bullet went whizzing past him, inches from his skull.

Nellie's scream seemed to drown out into nothingness, eclipsed by the rushing, whistling sound of the missed shot.

The Beadle didn't stop. He charged at them, raising the gun high above his head.

Sweeney turned to run…stumbled…Nellie's legs banged against the wall, tripping him up…

He had just managed to turn fully around when the Beadle came up behind him. Nellie watched, with a perfect view, as he brought the handle of the gun down with all his might---_CRACK---_over the back of Mr. Todd's head.

She watched his dark eyes…his dark, soft, wicked, beautiful eyes…roll back in his head as he pitched forward. He landed on top of her, the air knocking from her lungs as her back hit the floor. Her eyes widened…she gasped…

Beadle Connor was standing over them, panting.

Slowly, as if she were dreaming…Nellie turned her head to the side, and looked.

It was there…lying just a few inches in front of her face…cocked half-open, stained with dark, drying blood.

_The razor._

She waited until Beadle Connor was occupied dragging Sweeney's unconscious body off of her. She waited until the split second when his back was turned, the instant before he would seize her and drag her helplessly away.

Quietly, quickly, calmly…she picked up the razor, folded it shut, and slipped it into her sleeve.

The next second, Beadle Connor was towering over her, mouth open as he breathed heavily, sweat pouring from his face, blood trickling from his ear. He grinned demonically down at her. He said something, and Nellie watched his mouth as it moved…but she didn't hear a single word.

The only thing she heard was him…his voice…ringing in her ears, as a whisper, slow and soft…

"_Nellie. Marry me."_

Slowly, silently, she glared up at Beadle Connor.

_I will, Mr. Todd. I will live, long enough, to marry you. I swear to God, if it's the last thing I do, the moment before I die, I will marry you…_

…_I __**will**__._

A/N; There! You would actually not _believe _how difficult it is to try and end chapters with even the slightest bit of closure at this point in the story. This chap took some doin', believe me. Hope it satisfied at least a little portion of your insatiable Sweenett cravings. Reviews make me smile! ^_^


	34. Chapter 34

A/N; Hey everybody. Ok, here's the deal…I was planning to make this chapter much longer, and encompass pretty much the entire rest of the climax, but something's come up and I decided to cut it short so I could post it sooner. There was a recent death in my family, so suffice to say I may not be posting chapter 35 for a little while. I'll try to get it up soon…in the meantime, hope you enjoy this one!

Disclaimer; I don't own Sweeney Todd. Neither do you. Sad.

Chapter 34

_We All Deserve to Die_

The first thing he heard was her voice, cracking as she screamed in a hoarse, high-pitched fury.

"_You keep your bloody 'ands off me! GET 'EM OFF, I said!! You stay away from me!!"_

His eyelids fluttered, his mouth half-open in a daze of lingering unconsciousness. As sight flooded back to him and he blinked in the fog of colors and dim light, he became aware of a concentrated center of pain throbbing at the back of his skull. Groggily, he moved to lift his hand to touch the back of his head, and discovered that his arms were bound to something behind him.

"Oooohhh, jus' you wait 'til Mr. T wakes up…'e's gonna cut you into so many ribbons, we'll be able t'pass you through the bloody _key-hole!"_

"Yes, that's right…bluff all you want, _bitch…"_

"_OW! GET 'EM OFF ME, I SAID!!"_

Sweeney blinked, groaning faintly.

The moment he made an audible sound, Nellie's voice faltered, pausing abruptly and filling the room with a stiff, pounding silence.

He forced himself to open his eyes. He squinted forward, his shoulders hanging forward and his head half fallen on his breast. _His arms were tied…they were tied to back of the chair he was sitting in._

Peering through a haze of dizziness, he saw her…_Nellie. _She looked small and far away, sitting on the opposite side of the empty wooden room. Her frizzy hair sprayed wildly around her face as she stared back at him, her eyes wide and watching in the moment of stunned silence. He blinked again, his vision slowly blurring into focus---an instant knot, a concealed snarl of raw anger, clenched in his chest when he saw Beadle Connor standing behind her, his hands wound with rope as he was busily tying down Nellie's arms.

Her eyes caught hold of his, enormous pools of hope, trembling and shining…

"_Sweeney?" _she mouthed silently.

He narrowed his eyes, his lip curling into a sneer as he glared at the Beadle, who had evidently not noticed he was awake.

The points of light in Nellie's eyes grew brighter.

"Sweeney!" she cried, jerking forward in the chair, only to be yanked tautly back by the ropes binding her. The feet of the chair jumped and scuffled on the wooden floor.

The Beadle snarled in frustration, finally winding the last loop of the chord and snapping it so tightly it cracked like a whip. He stepped aside, glaring down at her, clearing his throat and straightening his collar.

For a strange, stilted moment, none of them said anything. Nellie stared at Sweeney…he stared at the Beadle, and the Beadle sneered down at Nellie. The quiet was as sudden as it was inexplicable.

Sweeney felt the breath rising faster and faster in his chest. He blinked away his confusion, his brain racing furiously…he narrowed his eyes into venomous black slits at the side of Beadle Connor's head. His fists clenched and unclenched, testing the security of the ropes---they were bound so tightly that they bit deep into his skin with every movement, cutting of the circulation and swelling pulses of blood into his hands. An indistinguishable growl, lost between hatred and desperation, rumbled in the bottom of his throat.

_What was he going to do with them now?_

He felt Nellie's eyes on him, watching, wide, frantic…he heard her shallow, frightened breath from across the room. He forced himself to stay focused, to keep his head clear and not let himself think---with a faint, irrepressible grinding of his teeth---about her cries of pain…_about the ropes digging into her wrists, the blood-soaked bandage covering her leg…_

And then, abruptly, he turned.

Sweeney jumped as Beadle's Connor's face turned calmly to look at him…his eyes quiet and half-lidded, a broad, relaxed smile melting underneath his mustache. The bandage was missing from his face, and on the left corner of his mouth was a hideous red gauge. Their eyes met, and Sweeney felt himself become perfectly still---his heart pounding slowly, fiercely---as they stared into each other's faces.

The Beadle took a few casual, strolling steps toward him. He actually hooked his thumbs in the pockets of his vest. He shook his head, chuckling faintly to himself, his gaze never breaking from Sweeney's blank, baited stare.

He clucked his tongue three times.

"Mr. Todd, Mr. Todd, Mr. _Todd…"_

He came closer, stopping a few feet in front of Sweeney's chair and gazing down at him with a sick, patronizing smile, almost like an old man smiling at some silly, nonsensical child's remark.

Sweeney felt the blankness of his face twisting into a grimace of loathing, the muscles in his jaw twitching spastically with the urge to do…._something._ A foreign, subdued form of rage was kindling deep inside of him.

The Beadle smiled and leaned forward slightly.

"This _has _been an amusing night, hasn't it?"

Sweeney glared and said nothing.

The Beadle laughed amusedly, straightening up.

"Yes, most amusing…although, now that's it all finished with, I suppose I must give credit where credit is due, eh? Very well then….I will say this for you, Mr. Todd. You, sir, are one _bothersome _man to pin down."

The Beadle laughed again, as if he'd said something funny. He circled slowly around Sweeney's chair, lifting his feet unnecessarily high off the floor as he sauntered. Sweeney stared forward, his eyes burning holes through the air…

For one brief moment, when Connor was behind him, he caught sight of Nellie.

_Nellie._

His glare lifted…ever so faintly.

She pursed her lips pleadingly, her wide eyes reaching out to him, aching, longing. He forgot where he was and tried to move toward her, only to tug uselessly against the tight, creaking ropes. The Beadle moved in front of him again, blocking her from his vision.

"No…bothersome doesn't _begin _to describe it," the Beadle muttered, the mocking joviality abruptly gone from his voice, replaced by a sharp, bitter loathing. "Do you have _any idea _the sort of _hell _I went through to reach this moment?"

Sweeney lifted his eyes to Connor's face, but still he said nothing. The gears in his brain were churning madly, all but blocking out the Beadle's oily voice.

_He had to do something…they had to get out of here, somehow…_

He pulled at the ropes again, his mouth clenching…he winced in pain as the chords burned into his skin, his arms completely immobilized. He jerked his feet, only to discover that they too had been strapped down, bound tightly to the two front legs of the chair. _Trapped…he was helpless…_

His heart beat like a slow, thundering drum in his ears. _He had to do __**something**__…_

"But," the Beadle said curtly, suddenly spinning around and wandering back to the other side of the room where Nellie was tied, "…that unpleasantness is all behind us, now. _Finally, _we can get down to business, and have this matter settled once and for all."

Suddenly, without warning, he reached out and put his hand on Nellie's shoulder. She recoiled, shuddering away and scowling daggers at him.

The instant they touched, it was like a fire burst to life in Sweeney's belly. His palms began to sweat, his pulse racing and his chest shaky with heavy breaths, a frantic desperation seizing hold of him like a vice. _They had to get out of here….they had to get out….__**Nellie**__…BASTARD, GET YOUR FUCKING---stay focused!! Keep him talking!_

"Connor!" he heard himself say sharply, his voice echoing in the empty wooden room.

The Beadle turned, eyebrows raised slightly in astonishment. He smiled amusedly.

"Yes? Something to say, Mr. Todd?"

Sweeney's eyes darted once between Nellie and the Beadle. He swallowed, forcing himself to breathe and speak calmly.

"I…I'll make you a bargain."

Nellie's eyes immediately widened, fear paling in her face. "NO! _NO! _Don't you _think it, _Sweeney, don't you even _dare---"_

"_Silence!" _the Beadle barked at her sharply. He turned back to Sweeney, a dubious tilt to his mocking expression. "A _bargain, _you say."

Sweeney's fingers clenched tensely. He nodded. "I'll give myself up, Connor. I'll go as quietly as you like…I'll say anything, sign anything, confess anything…if…if you'll let Mrs. Lovett go."

The fear in her pale face and trembling lips vanished and was replaced by burning anger. "_No!" _Nellie shouted furiously, piercing him with a jagged, incredulous stare. "You think I'd _leave you 'ere, _you_ idiot?? _I won't do it!"

Sweeney opened his mouth to shout back at her, but was cut off by the sound of Beadle Connor's roaring laughter. He dried his eyes falsely, degenerating into hysteric giggling. Sweeney swallowed thickly, nervously. _Damn it…__**damn it**__…_

"L-l-let…let her _go??" _the Beadle cried shrilly, gasping for breath between broken strains of laughter. "Oh, Mr. _Todd…_surely you don't take me for _that _great a fool? Why should I bargain for something I already _have? _Oh, heavens a_bove_…it's no wonder you resorted to murdering and stealing, Mr. Todd…no one with as little business sense as you would turn half a penny's profit in this town, even as a _barber!"_

Sweeney ignored the insults even as his heart was racing anxiously. _Just keep him talking…_

"Then what _is _your plan?" he muttered, struggling to keep his face dark and emotionless.

The Beadle chuckled darkly, moving to stand behind Nellie's chair, his hands resting calmly on the wooden back. She hunched over, turning her face to the floor so that her eyes were shadowed from view. Sweeney looked at her for a moment, his heart pounding…_his face resting over her clavicle…the dirty feeling of her tacky, blood-dried skin…her breath warm and close against his… _

_Think, damn it, THINK!_

"Well, I suppose you're going to find out soon enough anyway, aren't you?" the Beadle smirked. "Although there isn't much to tell, Mr. Todd…it's quite simple in fact."

Sweeney began gently, silently wrestling his hands against the ropes. They scratched and dug into his skin, searing like fire.

"At daybreak, Mr. Todd, I'm going to have the two of you delivered to Scotland Yard on official arrest for the murders of Judge Turpin, Beadle Bamford, Charles Connor, and Jack Bonnegen. You'll be held in prison until the trial date, and then, well…I'd put a good word in for Australia, myself, but it's ultimately the judge's decision as to where you'll be spending your life sentences."

Despite his desperate struggling against the bonds, Sweeney paused, eyes narrowing in blank disbelief.

"That's _all?" _he heard himself say aloud. Nellie looked up, her face questioning and anxious.

The Beadle's eyes widened, a tremor rippled beneath his mustache---and he once again burst out laughing.

"_Well, _that's the _short _version of it, at least," he cackled, hunching uncomfortably close over the top of Nellie's head. "The details, I'm afraid, will be much more tragic and much less…_compact."_

Sweeney bit back the urge to reply, focusing all his energy against the ropes. _Come on…come on…they weren't budging, not even a bit…he had to get free, he __**had to, **__before…_

"There may be a _few_ interesting things in the report," the Beadle continued. "All of which the four constables downstairs will bear witness to, of course. Yes, I'm sure it would be my sad duty to report the unfortunate actions of our own Officer Northing."

Nellie's head jerked up, fires erupting behind her eyes. She twisted her neck around to pin the Beadle a searing, demanding scowl of rage.

"What 'ave you done to 'im? _What 'ave you done to Daniel??"_

The Beadle made a shushing noise, patting the top of her head. Sweeney's teeth clenched so hard it jaw nearly locked.

"There, _there, _dear, nothing too serious. I was only trying to restrain the poor fellow, keep him from doing something he would sorely regret. Unfortunately, I had no choice but to become a bit physical when he resisted."

Nellie narrowed her eyes, muttering viciously beneath her breath. "What are you talkin' about?"

The Beadle shook his head, tsk-tsking. "It's a shame, my dear, but the sad truth is that some officers simply cannot control their tempers. Bless them, they mean well. It's their thirst for justice that makes them overdo things now and then. Poor Daniel Northing…I suppose when he saw the two of you at last captured and subdued---wicked, grisly murderers that you are---I suppose he was simply overcome with emotion for the unjust deaths of Judge Turpin and the others. He was left alone to guard the two of you, and…well…can anyone _truly _blame him if he was caught up in a bit of a frenzy and took it out on you? Of course, it isn't at all becoming of a police officer…abusing you both, beating you mercilessly, even _shooting _a defenseless woman in the leg…but thank heavens, I was able to drag him away before he did any further harm! He'll deny it all, of course, the dear boy…probably frightened out of his wits. But the other constables witnessed all of it. I'm sure they'll let him off easily…dishonorable discharge, few slaps on the wrist…he'll be alright."

The frantic desperation was steadily regaining its grip on him…Sweeney yanked and jerked at his bonds until they tore his skin, nearly drawing blood…and _still _the ropes remained locked in place, like cables of iron.

Nellie was veritably seething, shooting the Beadle with a look of hatred that Sweeney had not even dreamed possible of her.

"You…_rat…_you bloody…fucking, _son of a---!"_

_SMACK._

The sound echoed in Sweeney's ears. He immediately froze, ceasing his futile struggling against the ropes…ceasing to _breathe…_the Beadle's hand hung in the air, Nellie's head jerked aside in the direction that he'd slapped her, her eyes squeezed shut. For a moment, everything moved in slow motion.

The desperation vanished and was replaced by a much stronger desire…a pulsing, manic urge similar to the desire he'd felt when he'd first seen Nellie's bruised and bleeding condition. _The urge to destroy…the desire to make Beadle Connor suffer, to kill him as slowly as was humanly possible… _

His ropes creaked sharply as Sweeney threw himself forward in the chair so violently it was a miracle he didn't topple forward.

"_GET AWAY FROM HER!!!"_

His ragged, inhuman scream exploded like a crack of thunder in the small room. Beadle Connor only looked up, smiling calmly…_infuriatingly…_

"Yes," he suddenly whispered, his voice quiet and slimy, dripping with a sadistic pleasure. "Yes…that's it, isn't it?"

Sweeney's heart thudded in his chest so forcefully he felt as if it might fail any minute. His nostrils flared, his teeth bared as he tore ferociously at his tied arms, the chair inching minutely forward on the floor as he fought and thrashed like a caged animal.

"IF YOU _EVER, __**TOUCH HER AGAIN**__---"_

The Beadle laughed blatantly, leaning forward and pointing his chin at Sweeney as he wrestled uselessly against his bonds. Nellie was watching him, her eyes shining, frightened breaths heaving in her chest.

"Yes, _yes! _That _is _it! Ha! Do I know my criminals, Mrs. Lovett, or do I _know my criminals? _Here she is, your _one _purpose in life…_Mrs. Lovett_, the be all and end all of the pathetic little life of Sweeney Todd! A genuine _Achilles heel _if I ever saw one!"

Sweeney snarled and roared like a wild beast, his face twisted in a ceaseless growl of pure, primal rage. He had forgotten about focusing, forgotten about keeping calm and thinking of a way out of their hopeless situation. He forgot everything, but the echoing _smack…_the flinch of pain as she squeezed her eyes shut…it boiled his blood, blinded him with fury. If Connor had been close enough, he would have bitten him.

The Beadle grinned gleefully, a strange, sudden light of inspiration gleaming in his eyes. He crouched down behind Nellie's chair, his hands falling down to rest on her shoulders.

"You know," he said slowly, thoughtfully, smiling at Sweeney's futile struggling against the chair, "I _was _planning to begin with _you, _Todd…after all, you've been relatively untouched, as of yet, and I'm sure Daniel Northing in his impassioned throes would never have allowed that. But no…no…I believe there's a way to cause you far deeper pain than that. Oh, not that we won't get to that soon enough, but…yes…now that I think about it…there is a _much _better way to start our little evening off."

His hands moved slowly together and closed over Nellie's heart. She became rigid as a board, paralyzed with a trembling disgust. Her lips parted and she began to gasp for breath, her chest and shoulders heaving as her eyes desperately scanned back and forth on the floor.

In unison with her, Sweeney stopped fighting and became completely still. He panted for breath, but couldn't breathe. His eyes narrowed in a kind of horror and disbelief that could never be adequately expressed. His mouth hung open, unable to make a sound. In one instant, he became certain that if he didn't find a way to move his arms and legs, to unleash the compounding energy and rage building up in his muscles, he was going to die of asphyxiation.

Sweeney watched in a frozen, uncomprehending daze as the Beadle's hands slid lower and lower down Nellie's neck, petting her, caressing her skin. He felt a violent, unspeakable churn of nausea and fury as Connor lowered his mouth to her ear, his lips grazing it, moving slowly toward the side of her face.

Sweeney stared. He couldn't move, couldn't blink, couldn't speak.

_This wasn't happening. This…this wasn't…_

_But it __**was**__ happening, it was happening before his very eyes._

_No….this couldn't be real, this had to be a dream…_

_They figured she had to be daft, you see….so all of them stood there and laughed, you see…._

Nellie cried out, turning her face away. The Beadle only laughed and pulled her back to look at him. Her scream was muffled away as his lips mashed forcefully over hers.

Sweeney's brain screeched to a dead halt. He was reeling, drowning, like he was being suffocated. He felt as if he had blacked out, yet the sight still burned horrible into his eyes, refusing to disappear. He stared at them across the room as if they were miles away.

_Poor soul…_

Lines of tears spilled quietly from Nellie's eyes as she struggled against him. He grinned wickedly even as he pushed his mouth harder into her face, deliberately hurting her.

_Poor thing!_

It had happened so fast. Before he knew it, Sweeney was shaking his head back and forth, his face twisted, frozen horribly, as if he were going to sob.

_This wasn't real. This was a dream. A sick, cruel dream._

And then, without any warning at all…the Beadle's hand slipped down and clenched firmly, angrily, around her breast.

_No. It was real._

Nellie ripped her face away from his and screamed in a way that he had never heard a woman scream before…except in his nightmares.

_The scream…the scream of the __**used.**_

Everything left whole inside of Sweeney Todd snapped apart…within that single scream.

The next thing he heard was himself, shouting desperately across the room, his own voice sounding strange and unfamiliar.

"I'M SORRY!"

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

Nellie's lips trembled, the breath catching in her throat, her eyes burning and bleary as they ran with tears.

She wanted to thrash, wanted to shake herself all over, as if brushing live snakes off of her body…she wanted to vomit, but the bile had halted in her throat and hung there like a burning wave of heat. She fought with all her strength to pull away from him, but the ropes held her hopelessly bound in place---and it did no good to yank her head away from him…though she jerked away over and over, he diligently followed her every move, even having the gall to smile and mutter snide, comic remarks to himself as he did. She whimpered softly, closing her eyes against the sickening intrusion of the Beadle's hands, his face, his breath, hot and rank as it washed over her…he was all around her, she could _smell _him…everywhere was the perusal of his fingers, the disgusting carelessness…she was a piece of meat that he was using to dangle in front of a starving dog, tormenting him…

And then, drowning in an hysterical helplessness, she heard Sweeney's voice.

"I'M SORRY!"

It cut through her like a beam of light through fog. The Beadle's hands suddenly froze in place, one holding the back of her hair, the other gripping painfully around her left breast. Slowly, he pulled his head back…slowly he straightened up, turning to stare at Mr. Todd with a look of utter incredulity that Nellie felt rather than saw. She struggled to regain her breath, her eyes darting to look at Sweeney.

The expression on his face caused her own to fall completely and instantly blank with sheer astonishment. The tears ceased falling, the remnant of their trails drying quietly on her cheeks. Her lips hovered apart in plain, unblinking disbelief.

Sweeney was not looking at her. He was looked straight at the Beadle.

And he looked…

…_sorry? _

Truly…unabashedly…sorry.

A blank, consuming silence permeated the room.

The Beadle's hands limply fell away from her, and he moved away. She gasped, drinking in the clean swallows of air as frantically as if she'd been underwater. Her shoulders trembled, her heart pounding in horror at what had just happened…and yet, she couldn't tear her gaze away from Sweeney's face. His _eyes….she had never seen his eyes look that way before, never…_

Beadle Connor began taking slow, menacing steps toward the chair where Sweeney sat. Nellie watched them, trembling. Her lips pursed desperately.

_Sweeney…love…what are you doing??_

The silence was broken with a quiet, subdued mutter from the Beadle.

"What…did you just say?"

Sweeney's chest was heaving…he honestly looked as if he were ready to burst into tears at any instant.

"I'm sorry," he cried out suddenly, baldly, his voice ragged and almost hopeless. "I said _I'm sorry."_

Nellie couldn't see the Beadle's face, but she could imagine perfectly his scowling, seething glare of suspicion. He continued his dangerous advances toward the chair, his hands clenching at his sides. He went until he was directly in front of Sweeney, then bent forward so that their faces were a scant six inches apart. Nellie watched them, the tears threatening to begin again…_the sorrow in his black, swimming eyes…it was so real…too real…_her arms and legs ached with the desperate desire to break free, to run across the room and push the filthy scumbag away from him, to cut away those awful chords…to take Sweeney in her arms, hold him close to her heart, to ask him…_love…what is it?? What's wrong?_

She jerked futilely against the ropes, a dull sob lumping in her throat…and suddenly, she felt it. Her eyes shot open and the memory rushed back to her…_she felt it, there, the cool press of the folded metal against her skin…hidden, tucked away in the cuff of her sleeve…_

The Beadle's voice had lowered to a quivering mutter of rage, a whisper just barely above his breath.

"_What…_did you say?"

Slowly, silently, her eyes never tearing away from Beadle Connor's back and Sweeney's wide, desperate eyes…Nellie relaxed her arms. The ropes slackened---just the _slightest _bit---and she felt the cool, square cylinder of the razor slipping gently down her wrist. The end dropped into her palm, and her fingers clenched shut around it like a vice.

Slowly, silently---never _once _looking away, never making a single sudden movement---she turned the blade calmly in her fingers, sliding her thumb onto the catch.

Her heart pounded, her face was pale and blank…perspiration beaded on the back of her neck…she held her breath, closed her eyes, and…

_Snick._

Her eyes shot open. She drew a breath.

The Beadle hadn't noticed. He hadn't so much as flinched back in her direction.

Struggling to keep herself calm and her breath steady, Nellie carefully, tenderly turned the opened razor in her hands…she found the edge, found the last coil of her bonds, and gently began sawing, back and forth…back and forth…back and forth…

With ever slow, silent, calculated pass of the blade, more and more hairs of the rope split apart, fraying into two at a snail's pace. She pursed her lips, her eyes trained forward at Sweeney and Connor.

_Come on…come on…_

_A minute more, just one minute more…_

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

Beadle Connor was so close, Sweeney could feel his hot breath lingering between them. The Beadle's face was twisted in a knot of incredulous gall, but his eyes…his eyes looked as if they wanted to scream.

He repeated the question a third time.

"_What…did you say…Mr. __**Todd**__?" _he hissed dangerously.

Sweeney swallowed. He wanted to look at Nellie. He didn't.

"I'm sorry," he answered, his voice loud and firm even as it trembled, his throat dry and hoarse.

The Beadle stared emptily and said nothing.

_It had snapped, broken. Everything left inside of him had broken…it was like breathing for the first time, it was like being born. It was like having his chest ripped open and his heart held out in front of him for him to see._

All at one moment….at the moment of her scream…he had seen everything---everything that he had done, everything that he must now do. With one pained, desperate cry….she had made it all clear to him.

_He…_

_He, Sweeney Todd…_

…_was truly, honestly…_

"You're _what??" _the Beadle demanded, his lips curling in a bristled, disbelieving sneer.

When Sweeney spoke, he heard his voice as if it were coming from another person. And yet…he knew it wasn't. It was there, pulsing like a heartbeat at the core of his very being…_he was…_

"Sorry," he whispered, looking Beadle Connor straight in the eye. "I'm…sorry….for killing Charles Connor."

Silence.

The Beadle began to twitch. A spasm rippled through one half of his face, a vein throbbing from his temple all the way to his jaw. He looked as if he were on the verge of having a fit.

_There it was._

_**Salvation.**_

"I am sorry…from the bottom of my soul…_I am sorry that I killed Charles Connor. _He…didn't…deserve it._"_

The Beadle straightened up in one jerking movement, leering down at Sweeney so wildly the irises of his eyes nearly disappeared behind his bottom lids.

_Without any warning, without any thought at all…as sudden as a ray of light…there it was._

Sweeney Todd leaned forward in the chair, looking back up into the Beadle's eyes.

"Howard," he said quietly.

The Beadle was trembling.

"I am sorry for killing your brother."

Beadle Connor exploded.

With a horrible, screeching roar of frenzied rage, he pulled his arm back, his knuckles balled into a fist, and punched Sweeney square in the face.

There was a short, loud _crick! _as the bridge of Sweeney's nose cracked, the cartilage popping and a battering ram of invisible pain shooting into his brain, radiating like a hot coal between his eyes.

He blinked, his eyes instantly watering, his vision swimming before him…he coughed, and when he snorted, blood immediately spurted from his nose.

The Beadle was wheezing so loudly it very nearly seemed to drown out the sound of Nellie's scream. Sweeney had scarcely looked back up at him before the fist collided with his face again, this time hitting him in the jaw. His head jerked back, his neck cracking and the world swaying rapidly around him. Four more times Beadle Connor's punches knocked the light from behind his eyes, the sounds of packing flesh thudding in his ears…somewhere in the distance Nellie was crying, her ragged sobs interjected with shrieks of profanity at the Beadle…but through it all, Sweeney remained completely silentl. He did nothing but blink.

By the time the first round of blows had subsided, Sweeney's face was swelling with a heat more intense than any he'd ever felt. His head was a fog of dizziness…three Beadle Connors swayed and blurred in his vision. Vaguely, like something shouted across a street, he heard the Beadle's voice.

"_WHO DO YOU THINK YOU ARE??"_

He blinked. He sputtered briefly on the blood running from both his nostrils, swallowing it as it trickled chokingly down the back of his throat.

His silence only served the whip the Beadle's rage into a excited frenzy.

"YOU THINK IT'S _THAT EASY?"_

_THWOCK! _A second punch to the nose, though this one actually knocked the cartilage inadvertently back into place.

"YOU THINK YOU CAN JUST _SAY YOU'RE SORRY, AND MAKE EVERYTHING GO AWAY???"_

_THHUM! _At that blow, Sweeney could no longer maintain his silence…his mouth opened as he gasped hoarsely as the breath sucked from his body. Beadle Connor dug his fist so far into his gut, it felt as if his spine were pinned between the knuckles and the back of the chair…he held it there for several seconds. Sweeney felt involuntary spasms jerking through him, as if his body wanted to be sick in reflex to the punch. When the Beadle at last retracted his fist, he gagged, coughing uncontrollably.

"MEN LIKE YOU DO NOT KNOW THE MEANING OF THE _WORD, __**SORRY! **_MEN LIKE YOU DO NOT _FEEL REMORSE! _MEN LIKE YOU CANNOT _APOLOGIZE!!"_

Somewhere in the middle of his continual screaming, a faint, slowly growing seed of desperation had crept into Connor's voice…as if a desperate need to prove to himself that he was right.

His head hung low, his paralyzed throat clenching in a vain attempt at breath, Sweeney croaked quietly.

"I'm…sorry."

"SHUT UP!"

_THWACK. _Connor's knuckles packed into his left temple, flashes of pain reeling through his skull. Sweeney squeezed his eyes shut…and choked the words out again.

"I'm sorry."

"I SAID, _SHUT __**UP**__!"_

_THWOCK. _His other temple.

"_I'm…sorry…"_

"STOP _SAYING THAT!!" _the Beadle shrieked. _THWOCK. _His left eye.

When Sweeney was at last able to force himself to lift up his throbbing head, eyes watering profusely, the Beadle's face was once again hovering just over his. He spoke with his teeth clenched together so fiercely, the words were slurred together into tongued, guttural hissing.

"Do you want to know a secret, Mr. Todd?"

Sweeney's head dropped down again, his mouth open as he struggled for air. The Beadle seized a thick fistful of hair at the crown of his head and yanked it back up to seethe inches away from his face.

"I…_HATED…._my brother," he snarled quietly.

Faintly, his thoughts only half-forming, Sweeney narrowed his eyes blearily. He was beginning to feel a strange, hot sleepiness buzzing in his head.

"Let me make one thing _absolutely _clear," the Beadle muttered, his voice trembling with rage. "I…did _not…_open, this investigation, to avenge my _brother. _I did not open it to avenge Judge Turpin. I opened it, Sweeney Todd…because it is the duty, of men…like _me…_to _DESTROY, _men, like _you. _Because _you_, Sweeney Todd…are the devil. Because _you _are the spawn of evil in this world, and _I _am the hand sent to _crush you._ Because _you…deserve…to __**die."**_

Sweeney realized, fleetingly, that Nellie's cries had become silent some moments ago.

Slowly, carefully, he turned his eyes to look past Beadle Connor's face.

Slowly…quietly…he smiled. Not in malice, not in triumph…not in wickedness. Just, simply…a smile.

_For_ _her. For his bloody wonder._

_For his love._

He looked back at Beadle Connor. His bleeding smile widened.

"We _all _deserve to die," he whispered hoarsely.

_-_0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

Tears had blurred her vision as she forced herself to be silent. She swallowed her sobs and screams, her chin lowering and her shining eyes glaring like knives into the Beadle's back. With every deafening pack of his fists against Sweeney's face, the razor in her hand worked faster and faster, caring less and less how noticeable it was. By the time he'd gripped a chunk of Mr. Todd's hair to wrench his face up, the chair she sat in was veritably rocking back and forth with the frenzied sawing of the razor blade. She pursed her trembling lips together, staring, crying…_hating._

The pistol was stuffed into the back of the Beadle's waistband. Her eyes fixed on it like a cat watching a mouse from across the floor.

"….Because _you…deserve…to __**die."**_

_Snap._

For one frozen instant, the tiny sound rang like a bell in her ears…and then, with the slicing of one final strand, the coils instantly fell limp around her wrists and forearms.

In a single, gliding movement, she shrugged her arms out of the loops of rope and pushed herself onto her strong leg. She bit her lip, set her jaw, and took three steps…three _real steps…_across the room.

The pain was instant and blind. She sank her teeth so hard into her lip that it threatened to bleed…her fingers clenched around the razor so tightly her hand shook…fresh blood immediately seeped from the bullet wound, wetting the dry, crusted bandages anew and sending shrieking bolts of pain up and down the muscle. Three times, she bit back three successive cries of agony. She made no noise whatsoever.

In the corner of her vision around Connor's back…Sweeney smiled at her, and in that smile was said everything she could have ever wished to hear.

He looked back at the Beadle.

"We _all _deserve to die."

_We all deserve to die._

In one surreal instant, her fingers were wrapped around the handle of the revolver. Her face set in a cold, iron-wrought glare, she wrenched it out of Connor's waistband---her gimp leg hovering dangerously off-balance, her toes just grazing the floor---held her arm out in an arrow-straight line, and pointed the barrel into the back of the Beadle's head.

_Snick._

Everything fell immediately silent. The sound of the gun cocking resonated in the still air.

Beadle Connor froze. For a long, stunned moment…without turning to look…he just stood there, hunched forward at an awkward angle, Mr. Todd's hair still clutched in his fist.

Sweeney…simply smiled.

Nellie…did not.

"Let 'im go," she uttered in a voice that was so dark, it frightened even herself.

Gradually, the Beadle's fingers loosened from Sweeney's scalp. Still without turning around, he slowly, _slowly, _stood up straight, lifting his hands halfway into the air.

He said nothing.

Nellie held the nose of the gun pushed into the back of his skull.

"Do…not…move," she ordered blankly.

She turned to look at Sweeney. Their eyes met, for one bare, vacant instant…his smile quietly faded into something deeper. He narrowed his eyes at her, then nodded.

Her heart wanted to burst, her hands and body longed to touch him. Her emotionless fury didn't allow it. She held the gun stock-still in her hand.

"Untie 'im," she said quietly.

The Beadle…didn't move.

Fire flaring into her eyes, her lips parting and teeth baring, she thrust the revolver two inches forward, jabbing into Connor's head and making him stumble forward.

"UNTIE 'IM!_" _she practically screamed.

The Beadle still refused to look at her, but he obediently tripped forward, circling hastily around to the back of Sweeney's chair and setting to work at the knotted chords. The whole while he kept his face pointed down, his eyes averted, his expression blank and impossible to read.

Again, Nellie's sharp brown eyes met with Sweeney's weak, gazing black orbs…again she was nearly overcome with the desire to run to him, to finally let herself break down completely, and again the cold reality of the gun in her hand forbid it.

After what felt like an stiff, endless moment of silence, the ropes at last loosened and slipped quietly away. Sweeney was on his feet before they had time to hit the floor.

Without pausing, he strode straight up to Nellie, breaking her fierce coldness with the mere approach of his body. He stood for a single instant, inches away, looking down at her…his face hovered above hers, his eyes closed briefly…and then, she felt as he slipped the razor out of her left hand, and he moved away. She gasped suddenly in his wake, realizing that she'd not breathed while he stood near her. Her heart pounded wildly against her chest, her eyes fluttered for a short second…then, she swallowed, forcing her focus back to the gun still held at arm's length, and to the Beadle, who was now standing very strangely behind the chair, his hands braced on the back on the back of it and his head sunk down far below his shoulders. He stared down at the floor in complete silence, his face completely shadowed from view.

Sweeney Todd…calmly…began to walk toward him.

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

Sweeney, for the first time in what seemed like a hundred years…very suddenly felt like his old self again. In fact, for one fleeting instant, as he stared with cold, emotionless eyes at Beadle Connor standing there, helpless, defeated---for one fleeting instant, he seriously considered simply slitting his throat, then and there. _Just like the old days…_

His fingers twitched restlessly around the blade. He turned over his shoulder to look at Nellie.

The look that he saw in her eyes made him stop.

_Mr. Todd…_they said to him, softly, lovingly…almost frightened…

_Sweeney…_they said to him…

…_My love…_

Her voice came to him, an echo of a memory…a voice from another age, another world…and yet as breathy and gentle as if she were whispering it in his ear that very moment…

"_There ain't no sense in doin' anythin' what don't make you 'appy, love." _

Her lips pursed and opened silently, as if she were trying to speak, and the gun suddenly began to shake in her hand.

Her eyes stared, gleaming, the tears trembling in them like wavers of shining crystal…but never falling.

_My love…they said to him…_

…_I don't care. I don't care what else happens. All I want…all I've ever wanted…is for you to be happy. _

_Do what will make you happy, love._

He felt his face changing, his eyes squinting toward her, trying to answer her…but in the end, all he could do was turn back to face Beadle Connor.

To face him…once, and for all.

He didn't hesitate again. He crossed the room, kicked the chair aside, and seized Beadle Connor by the neck of his collar.

The Beadle immediately jerked his head up, his stoic, silent demeanor shattering into a gaze of pale sweat and utter, unadulterated terror. Before he could speak, Sweeney had propelled him backwards into the room's single window, his fist never unclenching from the scruff of fabric. His eyes were hard, black, and listless. He showed not the faintest trace of feeling…not even a single flush of anger.

The Beadles head and shoulders broke the window. The glass cracked into a spider web, the thin wooden frames broke and splintered…shards fell away a burst of cold air flooded into the room. For a single instant, Sweeney closed his eyes, drinking in the fresh air…then he opened them again, staring straight into the Beadle's cringing, horrified face. He wrenched him out of the broken window, dragged him across the room, and threw him into the wall. He hit it in a stumbling panic. He tried to scramble away. Sweeney was on him before he could so much as utter a cry of fright. He shoved him back against the wood again, so hard he crumpled and slid down onto the floor, his hands clenching the air in front of him, his eyes wide and his mouth moving in silent, hysterical jabbering.

Sweeney didn't so much as blink.

Calmly, blankly, he crouched down in front of the Beadle, looking down at him with empty eyes. The blood had stopped running from his nose…it was drying in a hard crust over his lips and chin. The bruises were surely beginning to form around his face and eyes. His abdomen throbbed.

He lifted the razor, turning it softly to its fully opened position. Half of his face shone back at him through the brown, tacky blood…his own eyes, as still and barren as a starless night. He turned it gently to the side…and saw Nellie, her blurry reflection framed in the silver blade, the gun trained stalwartly toward the Beadle.

At another time…he might have smiled.

He looked back at the man crumpled on the floor in front of him.

Beadle Connor had begun whimpering. His eyes were frenzied and terrified, the whites visible in a complete ring around his grey irises. His nose had started to run. He was emitting nonsensical, garbled strings of words that sounded something like pleads for mercy.

For a moment, Sweeney simply stared down at him. He was waiting for the rage to appear…waiting for the black burn of hatred, for the bloodthirsty desire to kill and mangle and torture. His right hand flexed on the razor. The shards of glass from the lamp were still wedged between his knuckles, but he barely felt them anymore. He felt…strangely, calmly…he felt almost nothing at all.

He thought of Mrs. Lovett. He thought of _Nellie. _He thought of her suffering, alone…he thought of her cringing in pain under the Beadle's hands, bleeding from the bullet wound in her leg…crying helplessly as he forced himself on her in the chair. _Nellie._

He waited for it to come.

It didn't.

He narrowed his eyes at the crying, sniveling heap in front of him. He hated Beadle Connor. He hated him in a way that he had never hated anyone…Cecil, Pirelli, Bamford, Turpin. He wanted…truly, at the core of his being, _wanted…_to kill him, to slit his throat and watch the blood run down. To avenge the pain that she had endured…the pain that _he _had ultimately caused.

He truly, honestly, wanted to.

But as he looked into Beadle Connor's petrified face…as Nellie's eyes lingered in his mind, her gentle voice drifting through him like a strain of unfeeling music…

He knew what he needed to do.

Quietly, without a flicker of emotion, he leaned forward and calmly pressed the blade of the razor into the Beadle's throat.

Connor squeal of misery was instant. He moaned, his voice trailing off into a pathetic whine. He squeezed his eyes shut, his body cringing into a rigid ball, his breath rushing through his teeth. Sweeney watched, almost in fascination, at his own hand holding the razor, as the smooth, flat edge of the blade pushing farther and farther into the soft skin. For what seemed a long moment, he held it there, still…unmoving.

When he spoke, his voice was dull and soft, calm and composed.

"Howard Connor," he said blankly.

The Beadle moaned, shrinking further away.

Sweeney blinked once, wearily. "Howard Connor. You've done horrible things. Sick…demented…horrible things. You've tortured innocent people. You've ruined innocent lives."

The Beadle fell to a soft, constant whine of hopelessness. The blade pressed closer into the flesh of his throat.

"Howard Connor. You deserve to die."

He uttered a wailing, agonized cry…a cry so pathetic, no one listening would have ever imagined that its owner was a grown man.

Sweeney's empty face softened…imperceptibly. He almost sighed.

"You deserve to die," he repeated, quietly.

And just as calmly as he had pressed it there…he drew it away again. The razor lifted from the Beadle's throat. Sweeney sat back on his heels, his hands hanging relaxed over his knees. Trembling, whimpering…not daring to believe it…his eyes fluttered fearfully open. Sweeney shook his head softly, and spoke in a deep, muttering whisper.

"_But I don't deserve to kill you."_

Everything was moving slowly, surreally…and yet fast and untraceable. Without fully knowing it, Sweeney was again standing up. He towered over the shaking lump that was Beadle Connor, looking blankly down at him.

"You are an evil man, Mr. Connor," he said quietly. "And like all evil men, the day will come…when you will be called upon to pay for your crimes. But it will not be me, Mr. Connor. You deserve to die. To suffer. You deserve to be killed. But not by me. It will be a man far better than me, Mr. Connor, who brings you to the fate you deserve."

The Beadle said nothing. He was staring up at Sweeney as if he were staring into the face of the sun.

Sweeney felt one corner of his mouth turn up in a strange, almost pitiful smile. Gently, he shook his head once back and forth.

"You said that it is the duty of men like you to destroy men like me." His smiled quirked further up…but his eyes remained cold, remorseless, and dark. "Beadle Connor, sir. The only difference between you, and me, is that I _understand my own guilt. _You have to live…so that someday, soon…you will realize what you are. Because that…will be the worst punishment of all."

The Beadle stared speechlessly. Sweeney smiled at him a final time.

"Believe me. I _know."_

And without another word…without another thought…he turned and walked away.

He didn't look back. He went to Nellie. Her wide, gazing eyes where bright with tears, shining with a strange emotion that he couldn't place.

"Let's go," he said softly.

He turned to pick up the coils of rope lying on the floor, preparing the tie up the Beadle…when Nellie's voice suddenly stopped him.

"Wait," she said firmly. "I've got a better idea."

He turned to look questioningly at her…but she was looking across at the Beadle, who had not moved from his collapsed position at the corner of the wall. Her voice quaked as she spoke darkly beneath her breath.

"Mr. Todd is right," she said quietly. "But I believe, sir, if I recollect…there was somethin' you said to me, that I also agree with. Now, what _was_ it…"

The Beadle's eyes---which had been growing calm and mystified as the realization gradually dawned on him that he was not going to be murdered---abruptly shot open in terrified understanding. Just as he opened his mouth to speak, Nellie cut him off.

"Oh, yes, that's it…an _eye for an eye."_

_**PAAUUCCHH!**_

Sweeney flinched, only slightly, as the blinding flash and a deafening report of the gunshot blasted the atmosphere of the room.

"AAAA_UUUUGGHH!"_

The Beadle's shrill, cracking wail of pain pierced their ears as blood gushed up from the fresh hole just below his left kneecap. He seized it with both hands, rolling to his side on the floor, writhing and howling in agony.

Nellie's face was set in a blank stare. She lowered the gun to her side, smoke drifting from the barrel. She looked down at the Beadle without blinking.

Sweeney watched her only for a moment, his heart pounding…then, quietly, he moved behind her and swept her up from the floor into his arms, gently raising her bad leg and cradlingher against his chest. She didn't mutter so much as a single word of protest or alarm. She turned immediately, wrapping her arms around his neck and burying her face beneath his jaw. He felt the wetness of tears dabbing at his skin, and held her closer.

Neither of them looked back as they turned and walked---swiftly, hastening almost to a run---out of the room, through the corridor, and down the stairs.

A/N; Hope you liked this chappie alright, and sorry for any grammatical errors…I didn't have much time to proofread. Reviews make me smile!


	35. Chapter 35

A/N; Woot!! Chapter 35 is finally up! Sorry for the wait…you would not _believe _the kind of homework load I've been trapped under lately. Thank you for your patience…and enjoy! Also, brief WARNING; this chapter contains at least one scene of rather explicit nastiness…by which I mean gore. So heads up! ^.^

Disclaimer; I do not own him, _Sweeney Todd…_and if I did, it would be odd. Most likely I would ruin all, with Sweeney at my beck and call…it's best if Sondheim owns him still, so ruin things, I never will. I'll be content to sigh, and nod…I do not own him, _Sweeney Todd._

Chapter 35

_Salvation_

or

_Fleet Street Again_

_KA-CHA-CHA-CHINK!_

"_Yes!!" _Daniel cried out in relief, bursting into gales of breathless, triumphant laughter. The joint of the gas pipe, after nearly half an hour of desperately muttering obscenities and frantic, tireless jerking of the chain, had finally snapped cleanly in half.

Daniel wrestled the manacle chain through the broken section of pipe, gas immediately flowing out in a soft, audible, invisible rush, the sharp chemical smell assaulting his nostrils. He rolled away from the wall, panting, and with a groan of effort jerked himself up into a sitting position. With only slight difficulty, he passed his manacled hands beneath his body, under his legs and feet…the instant his arms were in front of him, he scrambled awkwardly to his feet, blinking as the world swayed beneath him. Without pausing for an instant, even to clear the dizzy rush behind his eyes, he set off at a dead run through the doorway.

The first place he ran to was the wooden cell on the second floor, where Mrs. Lovett had been locked away….the place that he'd heard the first gunshot ringing from, the gunshot that had sent a freezing jolt of panic and terror straight through his heart. Less than three minutes ago, he'd heard a second shot…but he'd been unable to tell where it emanated from. It had seemed to ring around him, everywhere at once.

The door was hanging wide open…the cell was empty. He looked wildly about him, panting heavily…the light had been shattered…there was no one there. He looked down. His eyes widened when he saw the ring of keys sitting quietly on the floor a few feet away.

Seconds later, the manacles slipped free of his wrists and fell down to the floor, clattering noisily. For one extended, horrible moment, Daniel cast about in every direction, not knowing what to do or where to go.

_Where were Mrs. Lovett and Mr. Todd? Where was Connor? Had they escaped before the Beadle found them? What was the meaning of the two shots he had heard…why had they been so far apart?_

Shaking, wetting his lips nervously, he ran to the top of the second-floor staircase.

"Mr. Todd?" he called loudly, his voice ringing off the bare walls.

Silence permeated after his echo faded. Sweat beaded on his brow.

"Mr. Todd? _Mrs. Lovett?"_

Nothing. The house felt as empty and still as a churchyard. His heart pounding wildly, Daniel threw himself down the stairs, his hand sliding on the banister and his footsteps thundering like a herd of elephants as he ran down to the first floor. He took off like a madman, running through hallways, looking into every open door. He ran to the kitchen, ran to the foyer…he ran everywhere, his voice echoing through the empty corridors.

"Mrs. Lovett! Mr. Todd! Are you here??"

Everywhere, he was met silent rooms and empty halls.

He didn't know how long he searched for…perhaps it was five minutes, perhaps it was twenty. Time seemed to slip away from him---everything was an endless, breathless panic of footsteps and darting gazes, hands on doorways and heartbeats from the back of his mouth. The more he looked, the more fearful he became…_did this mean that they'd escaped, that they'd managed to get free of the mansion and the Beadle? If they had…then where was Connor? Why couldn't he find him anywhere?_

In a daze, he climbed the stairs again, ascending all the way to the third floor. He hurried through the narrow, dimly lit hallways, yelling, pleading for a reply, _any _reply…when suddenly, something dark and gleaming caught his eye, and he stopped. His breath caught in his throat, and for a few seconds he stared down at it, paralyzed in horror.

_Blood. _From an open doorway, trailing down the hallway, disappearing all the way around the corner ahead of him…dark, wet trickles and small pools of black-red blood, marked all the way with loping, uneven footprints. Along the wall at broken intervals, handprints of blood stood out stark and frightening against the whitewash.

_Footprints…handprints…blood…but whose??_

His heart pulsing in his mouth, Daniel tore himself from his horrified trance, following the trail of blood at a stumbling run. It wound around two corners and led him to a tiny, narrow staircase set into the far West wing of the building…a hidden staircase, probably unknown and unused by anyone but the former servants of Turpin's mansion. The blood lessened in quantity the farther he followed it, but at the very top of the winding staircase was a dark red pool, spreading slowly and seeping into the wood, as if whoever it belonged to had fallen there for a moment, unable to rise. Daniel swallowed thickly, and bracing himself, plunged down the dark stairwell, feeling along the walls and railing as he went. Around and around he went, for what felt like much longer than it should have taken him…until finally, he again burst into the light of gas lamps. He looked around. The trail of blood continued off to both his right and left…to the right, in the direction of Turpin's study---_why would the wounded person have gone there? _he wondered fleetingly_---_and to the left, only a few meters away, at the end of the building where a wooden door opened into the carriage house.

Daniel sprinted toward the door, his heart throbbing in his mouth. _God…please….__**please, **__let them be alright…__**please**__…_

He burst into the cold, dusty air and dim kerosene glow of the small carriage house. He jerked his head to the right, and froze abruptly in shock.

For one surreal, stunned moment, his eyes met with the Beadle's. Connor was hanging halfway off of the unsaddled back of a snorting, pawing red gelding. Blood had soaked one entire leg of his pants, his shoes dripped with it…his hands were smeared to the wrists with red…and clenched in his right fist, almost hidden in the long mane of the horse, gleamed the dark metallic barrel of a revolver.

_The study…he must have gone there to get it…_

For one instant, they stared at each other. The horse whinnied shrilly, the sound high and frenzied. The other horses were shifting nervously in their stalls.

The Beadle blinked, shook himself…and with a ragged snarl of effort and pain, he hoisted himself the rest of the way onto the horse, swinging his wounded left leg over with a limp _thump. _He hadn't even taken the time to bridle the horse, and he yanked himself up with his fingers clutched in its mane. The animal shrieked---reared onto its hind legs, almost bucking the Beadle off its back---and set off at a wild gallop through the open doors of the carriage house as Connor kicked it viciously in the flanks, shouting indistinct, savage cries at the top of his lungs.

The moment before they vanished from sight, the Beadle suddenly jerked around, swinging the gun in a wild half-circle behind him, and shot. Daniel's eye widened in shock as he hit the floor, the bullet missing him and sinking into the wood of the opposite wall.

_TTTSSSIIIING!_

Breathing heavily, he looked up. The Beadle was gone.

Daniel swore aloud.

Without pausing, he scrambled to his feet and ran to the nearest occupied stall, throwing it opened and darting in past the anxiously stomping horse. He shushed it frantically, guiding it out into the open by the neck as quickly as he could, his gaze darting repeatedly to the door. He swore again.

There wasn't even time for a bridle. With a grunt of effort, he heaved himself up onto the horse's back, his leg swinging in a rapid arch, quickly righting himself. The animal whinnied loudly, but Daniel paid it no attention.

"YAH!" he shouted, digging his heels into its sides and gripping it around the neck for dear life as it took off toward the door in a galloping flurry of hooves and snorts. Daniel set his jaw, his teeth clenching together as he burst out into the dark, snowy street. He looked up, and narrowed his eyes in a cold steel of determination, tempered with a sharp pang of his heart.

_There they were!!_

His voice cracked hoarsely as he screamed above the snow and hoof beats.

"MR. TODD! _RUN!!!"_

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

For the space of about forty seconds, Sweeney's mind had blanked out completely.

One instant he was crossing the threshold of the room, not so much as batting an eyelid at the horrific wails of pain issuing from Beadle Connor as he writhed and twisted on the floor behind them---Nellie cradled tightly in his arms, her face buried in his shoulder---her warmth, pulsing through him like a second heartbeat---and then, before he knew it, he blinked, and they were standing once more out in the open, breathlessly cold air of the street, the soft glow of the streetlights surrounding them, the starless night permeated with silence in every direction. Sweeney blinked again, plodding down the front steps of the mansion like a sleepwalker and coming to a stop on the cobblestone walk.

_Were…were they really outside? It had been an eternity since he set foot in the mansion, and yet…at the same time, it had all happened in the blink of an eye, and now…was it really possible? It was over?_

Snow was falling. He blinked away the thick, feathery flakes that stuck in his eyelashes. He turned to look at Nellie. She had lifted her face from his shoulder, and was looking around with a dazed, quiet expression, her eyes half-lidded and bleary with tears. She looked as if she'd just awakened from a strange, surreal dream, and didn't yet know where she was.

For one silent moment, they stood there together, their gazes trolling slowly up and down Bell Court, drinking in the peaceful stillness of the night. Sweeney squinted toward the east…there, far away, just beginning to bleed up over the rooftops, was a thin wash of pale, golden light. He stared at it, and a faint movement began to stir inside him. In spite of himself, of the blood crusted over his face and the countless throbs of pain still pulsing through his body…one corner of his mouth quirked into a half-smile.

_Always darkest…just before the dawn._

He turned to look at Nellie.

"Are you in any pain?" he asked gently, craning his wrist to lift the hand pinned beneath her back and brush a strand of hair from her face. She didn't answer, didn't look at him…she stared out into the street, her face at once blank and full of disbelieving wonder.

"We're free," she said suddenly, her voice catching deep in her throat.

The smile quirked further as he tenderly watched her, her profile white and beautiful against the darkness.

"We're free," he said softly.

She blinked, then turned to look at him, their eyes meeting and their faces inches apart. For the first time in longer than he could remember, she smiled back at him…with the real, honest smile of plain and untainted happiness, the smile she had used to give him long ago, before he ever knew what it really was.

"It feels…strange," she grinned lopsidedly. "…to be free again."

He nodded. He wanted to say something, but the words seemed to stick and dwindle away in his throat. _No…it was alright, for now….to just say nothing._

Sweeney shifted her in his arms, holding her higher, as he turned and scanned his eyes a second time up and down the quiet street. When his gaze lighted on the familiar, lamp lit corner, something caught his attention, and he paused. He narrowed his eyes, his mouth pressing into a firm line.

"What is it?" Nellie asked.

His brow furrowed thoughtfully. "I told them to leave as soon as they were out," he muttered, peering thinly at the dark shape of the hansom cab sitting quietly at the corner. "But…for a moment, I thought I saw…"

"_Toby!!"_

Nellie's eyes shot wide open, her high pitched cry piercing inches from Sweeney's ear and making his eyelids flutter. He shook himself, his discomfort quickly replaced by utter, blinking astonishment as he realized that the short, shadowed little figure sitting at the back of the hansom was indeed none other than their Toby. As Nellie's shrill voice echoed across the empty square, the boy jerked his head up, bolting to his feet on the driver's perch of the cab.

"MUM!" he shouted, his small voice carrying like the cry of a bird. Sweeney jerked back to his senses, setting off at a half run across the street and toward the corner where Toby was scrambling down from the back of the hansom as fast as his trembling hands allowed.

"Toby! _Toby!" _Nellie called over and over, her voice breaking into euphoric sobs even as they ran. "Toby, Toby, my love…my boy, my _boy_…"

The moment they were within reach of the carriage, Sweeney started in surprise as Nellie tore herself away from his grasp, practically throwing herself on the ground and nearly falling flat on her face. Toby's feet hit the pavement and he was sprinting toward them; Nellie dropped to her knees, spread her arms wide, and caught him as he dove into her.

"Mum! It's you! It's you, it's really you…it is you, isn't it? You're real? It's really you!" Toby's tearful cries of joy degenerated into muffled, incoherent sounds of muttering and sobbing as he buried his face in her chest. Nellie had pressed her mouth into the crown of his head, tears rolling down her cheeks as she squeezed her eyes shut and veritably crushed him into her, rocking gently back and forth. And for once…she didn't utter so much as a single word.

Sweeney stood behind them, watching, a strange and unfamiliar sensation settling in around his heart. He felt a dry lump at the back of his throat, and the sudden, unexplained desire to kneel down and encompass them both together in his arms.

_A woman…and her child…._

_My wife…and my son._

His heart was thick and heavy…an emotion of fatherly instinct stronger than any he'd yet felt washed over him, and he moved forward, one hand extended toward them, not half knowing what to do…when he was stopped by a sharp voice calling his name.

"_Sweeney! _Oh, Mr. Todd…_my friend_…thanks heavens you're alright!!"

He looked up to see Anthony, his eyes wide and flashing with relief as he climbed down from the seat of the carriage. Before Sweeney could open his mouth the sailor had rushed forward and seized him by the shoulders, gasping with laughter, his teeth flashing in a jubilant grin.

"Oh, Mr. Todd!…you have _no idea _how terrified we've been! We were afraid you…that you'd…but, my friend, _look _at you! You're a mess! What did that monster do to you?…to both of you?? You're bleeding, Mr. Todd, you need to…but…_oh,_ but I'm just so relieved you're _alive!…_and Mrs. Lovett! Mrs. Lovett, mum, are you alright? Your leg is bleeding!"

As quickly as he'd descended upon him, Anthony tore away and dropped to his knees beside Nellie and Toby, laying his palm on her back and trying to see into her face. She didn't even look up at him…she was too absorbed with Toby, smothering his face and head with kisses and hugging him so tightly he could scarcely breathe.

Sweeney looked down at the three of them, a foreign feeling twitching through his face. He smiled. He glanced up at the mysterious hansom, at the patiently standing black mare, wondering where in the world they could have possibly acquired either…

…and his smile abruptly vanished.

A cold hollowness emptied inside of him, the warmth and happiness of his family disappearing in one dark, unmoving instant.

He stared at her, his face slowly drawing in pain.

Johanna sat in the seat of the hansom, her wide, terrified eyes locked unbreakably with his. Her face had blanched as pale as paper…she trembled silently, her mouth open, paralyzed in complete and utter horror. Her fingers gripped the cushion of the seat tighter and tighter, her gaze never once blinking from his face.

She looked as if she were staring into the face of Death himself.

Faintly, distantly, like a horrible music box playing slowly in the back of his mind, he saw her…_disguised in boy's clothes, his bloodstained face reflected in the shine of her enormous eyes, trembling with fear as he lifted the razor threateningly to her throat, her collar clenched in his fist…the dark, wicked curl of his lip as he sneered softly at her frail, shaking form… _

"_Forget my face."_

Sweeney watched her, unable to move, his features twisted in despair. The lump in his throat had tripled in size…he couldn't speak, couldn't even breathe. When he had said goodbye to Johanna in that room…he had meant it to be the final time he would ever see her in this world. He had meant never to come face to face with her again…to never again force her to relive the terror he had caused her that black, awful night…

_But there she was. Looking straight at him. She saw him._

_She saw __**him.**_

His lips parted, the breath quivering in his throat. He couldn't stop himself. He heard his own voice, unrecognizable as he uttered forth in a choked, tremulous whisper…

"Jo…Johanna…"

Like the swell of an invisible tide, her horror peaked, and became too great for the waking world. Her eyes rolled in the back of her head, and she fell limply back against the seat in a cold faint.

Sweeney's jaw hovered soundlessly, her name lost on his tongue. He was shaking. His eyes stung.

Anthony suddenly turned and looked at him.

"Mr. Todd? What is it?"

He turned to the carriage, his smile fading. He rose quickly to his feet, running around to the opposite side of the hansom and leaning toward her.

"Johanna? _Johanna! _Darling, can you hear me? _Johanna?"_

Sweeney watched in an unblinking trance. For one horrible moment, time seemed to stand still as he watched Anthony gently stroking her forehead, cupping her face and calling her name over and over.

The snow fell softly all around him. It seemed to faze the whole world into silence…but it couldn't quiet the cries of misery aching like stabs of shooting pain in his chest.

He was at last dropped back to earth when he saw Nellie's head jerk up in the corner of his eye, her face suddenly urgent.

"Mr. T!" she cried desperately, swiveling to sear him with a burning gaze. _"We forgot about Daniel!" _

Sweeney looked at her, his heart pounding, his head swimming between one world and another…he opened his mouth to answer, when suddenly _the sound_ blasted through the night, shattering the quiet of the snow and the darkness and turning all their heads simultaneously back toward the Judge's mansion.

_**PAAUUCCHH!**_

Sweeney's pupils dilated. His heart leapt into his mouth.

It happened…right before his eyes…but still he shook his head, refusing---_trying _to refuse---to believe it.

_You've got to be joking._

The hoof beats were muffled, clattering dully in the newly fallen snow…the enormous red horse came stumbling out of the carriage house at a half-run, tripping over its own legs and whinnying shrilly in protest.

Sweeney's arms dropped limply to his sides. His body had swiftly gone numb.

Beadle Connor was sprawled haphazardly over the horse's back, his wounded leg dangling uselessly down and trickling blood in the snow. His other leg was caught halfway beneath him, his foot catching in the back and throwing off his balance. With one hand, he clutched the horse's mane so fiercely the poor animal whinnied in pain, snorting indignantly as it spun in disoriented circles…with the other hand, he held a pistol, still smoking from its last shot. He was shouting curses, but they were not words any human could decipher…he swayed and pitched like a drunken lunatic, the barrel of the gun flying in every direction.

For one horrible instant as the horse turned in circles and the Beadle fought to regain control over it, every one of them stared in stunned silence. Sweeney was the only one among them who moved…he shook his head back and forth, an unrecognizable emotion halfway between anger, sheer exhaustion, and a twist of ironic humor rising inside of him.

_You have __**got**__…to be joking._

With a final grinding, wrenching yank of its mane, Connor righted himself on the animal and quelled it to a stomping halt. From all the way across the square, his burning eyes…no longer cold and steely, but ablaze with a mad, senseless frenzy…locked squarely with Sweeney's.

The next instant, before anyone could move, a second horse came galloping wildly out of the carriage house, it's rider urging the animal desperately onward.

Simultaneously with Beadle Connor's crazed roar as dug his heels into the horse's flanks, none other than Daniel Northing's voice carried frantically over him to where they stood frozen in shock around the hansom.

"MR. TODD! _RUN!!!"_

The words shot through him like a jolt of electricity and he sprang into action.

"IN THE COACH!" he shouted, every other thought and emotion immediately vanishing from his brain, his voice so sharp and immediate that no one so much as blinked in disobedience.

Anthony leapt into the carriage, nearly stumbling over Johanna's legs, seizing her unconscious figure in his arms the moment he fell into the seat. Toby jumped to his feet and frantically tried to help Nellie to rise from her shaking knees, but Sweeney swooped down and lifted her in his arms before she could stand.

"IN, TOBY! _NOW!"_

The thundering of the hooves was growing louder and louder as the horses picked up speed, barreling down the long, quiet street…Connor and Daniel's voices were mixed together and lost in a string of wordless shouting.

Sweeney tried to drop Nellie into the hansom as delicately as he possibly could without slowing down, but nevertheless she bounced a bit and gripped her hands on the seat to keep herself upright. Toby scrambled up beside her in the blink of an eye, and Sweeney didn't wait to look twice at all of them squashed there together before jumping to the back of the cab and flinging himself up into the driver's seat.

It was with a numb, half-blind surge of desperation that he seized the reins, lifted them high over his head, and cracked them down with all his might, shouting at the top of his voice…

"_YAHH!"_

The horse shrieked in alarm, then took off at such a pace that each passenger of the hansom was thrown violently back in their seat…Sweeney, having no roof or carriage wall behind him, flung backward so sharply he very nearly toppled out of the cab. He clenched his fingers around the reins so tightly the glass shards between his knuckles cut even deeper, at fresh angles…he gritted his teeth, straightened his willowed spine with a ragged growl, and looked back.

They were speeding down the snowy cobbled streets so rapidly, they had already left Bell Court and the House of Records shrinking away behind them. The ice-cold wind whipped Sweeney's clothes and hair wildly, stinging his eyes and making them water. He squinted, his heart pounding with sheer adrenaline…Connor was less than four paces behind them, the terrible, insane lights in his eyes burning through the darkness like twin torches of hellfire. He screamed and goaded his horse with every gallop, kicking his heels---even that of his injured leg, somehow---so hard and repeatedly into its sides it was a wonder the animal could breathe. Far behind him, far enough that none of his desperately shouted cries could be made out, was Daniel, frantically urging his own horse to run faster, yet continuing to fall hopelessly farther and farther behind.

Sweeney whipped his head back to look in front of them…he didn't realize it in the thick of the moment, but his face was drawn in a pale expression of panic. The metallic flash of the gun barrel, along with Connor's crazed, inhuman eyes, hung in his mind like a shroud. The Beadle was more dangerous in that moment of reckless frenzy than he had ever been in the Judge's mansion. Sweeney cracked the reins over and over, pleading silently with the black mare to run as fast as her legs could carry them. Where they were running to, he didn't know…he saw nothing of the buildings they raced past, noticed none of the corners they swerved dangerously around, teetering on their outer wheels…he only knew that they needed to _move faster. _

He looked behind them again. It was no use…their black mare, latched and held back by the weight of the hansom and its five passengers, could never hope to outrun an enormous gelding burdened only by a single rider. The Beadle was scarcely two lengths behind them.

"_Sweeney!" _a frightened voice cried out to him, carried on the wind. _It was Nellie._

"HOLD ON!" he shouted. He ground his jaw, held his breath…and jerked the reins. The horse whinnied as it was yanked unexpectedly to the side, the hansom swerving hazardously, nearly overturning…he looked back again, and swore loudly even as the vice of fear gripped tighter around his heart, accompanied by a sudden clench of hysterical panic.

Beadle Connor was less than a pace behind them, and appeared to be coming upon them faster and faster every instant. His horse was frothing at the mouth, the whites of its eyes flashing wildly as it shrieked and heaved…a foam of sweat flecked its neck and flanks. Sweeney watched in horror as the tip of its red muzzle passed him by. He looked up…straight into the Beadle's burning eyes.

There was no pause, no moment of exchange. Frothing nearly as madly as his horse, Connor reared back the arm that held the pistol. Sweeney stared into the dark hole of the barrel as streetlights and storefronts went speeding by.

A combination of Nellie, Toby, and Anthony's voices echoed in his ears.

"_NO!!"_

_**PAAUUCCHH!**_

Sweeney gasped, his chest heaving, his eyes shooting open…it happened in less time than it took him to blink…he was doubled over in the driver's seat, his face nearly pressed into the roof of the carriage. His heart was beating so rapidly it physically pained him. He could practically _feel_ the lock of hair at the back of his head that the bullet had shot through and severed. _If he had ducked only the __**fraction **__of a second too late…_

The Beadle snarled furiously at his failed shot, his teeth bared, the gun already raised and cocked for another round.

Sweeney didn't think. He lifted the reins and cried out in a ragged growl, jerking them as far and fiercely as he could to the right.

The last thing he saw was Connor's eyes, widening instantly in shock as the wooden body of the hansom rammed into him. The horse whinnied at a pitch so shrill it made Sweeney cringe…there was a terrific, shrieking _CRASH! _as wood splintered and hooves flailed into the air. Connor toppled down from his mount and abruptly vanished from sight.

Sweeney gripped the reins frantically, struggling to right the hansom onto four wheels again as Nellie and the others screamed in broken intervals. _CRUNCH! _Without slowing, even for an instant, the second two wheels thudded heavily back onto the cobblestones. They sped through an intersection, and Sweeney felt his heart skip as another coach appeared out of nowhere around the corner, veering so close to them the two nearly collided. The other driver's furious cursing lingered in the air and shrank away behind them…Sweeney craned his neck to look back at them, and he noticed that the sun had risen further above the horizon. Half of the sky above them was now washed in a pale, watery grey and blue, streaked with the first rays of sunlight.

_Dawn. London was beginning to awaken…carriages and bustling crowds would soon be filling the streets. _Here and there, in the far, fleeting corners of his periphery, he could just glimpse the earliest of the wandering pedestrians and homeless beggars already beginning to crawl out of the woodwork_. _His mouth dry and his mind racing, Sweeney jerked back to look behind them again…and stopped.

Far away, scarcely more than a roan dot on the horizon almost five blocks back, he could see Connor's horse…it had been torn asunder by the blow of the hansom, and was still tossing helplessly on its side, unable to right itself, its hooves flailing in the air.

_There was his horse…_

…_but then…where was…??_

_**PAAUUCCHH!**_

The carriage beneath him erupted into a fray of terrified screams. If his passengers had been within his line of vision, he would have seen them frantically tossing their heads in every direction, their eyes wide with panic, not knowing from which direction the shot had come. As it was, Sweeney was too preoccupied with the burst of searing pain in his right arm to notice their cries of alarm.

"_Agh!!" _Sweeney snarled, the hansom veering to one side as he dropped the reins in his left hand and seized the bleeding wound on his arm. Teeth grinding against the hot pain, he shot a glance down at it---once again, it was nothing but sheer luck that had spared him. The bullet had only grazed him…it was little more than a gouge beneath the muscle of his shoulder…but the blood had already soaked half of his white sleeve in brilliant crimson, and the torn flesh burned like fire.

He looked straight down behind him in the direction the shot had come from. His eyes widened.

Beadle Connor was gripping the footstep railing of the hansom with one hand, his knuckles whiter than the snow he skidded across. The other hand gripped the pistol for dear life, the barrel bucking and waving as he was jostled along the cobblestones at breakneck speed. His eyes flashed, every one of his teeth visible in a snarling, manic wince of the most grating sensation imaginable. His body dragged behind the carriage like a rag doll, his injured leg jumping and flopping uselessly. They were moving too fast for it to even leave a trail of blood in the snow.

"LOOK OUT!" Toby's voice, small and far away sounding, snapped Sweeney from his moment's trance, and he jerked back to look at the road. His chest seized in panic as he yanked the reins with all his might, just managing to swerve out of the way of an oncoming cab. His breath heaving wildly in and out, his head darted back and forth between the street and the Beadle. He had no idea what to do.

Connor's grip was like a vice. The Beadle had finally lost his senses completely---his body was being bruised and mangled beyond recognition, and yet he refused to relinquish his hold on the rail---he twisted and tossed, flipping once for a few seconds onto his back, his shoulder wrenching unnaturally. Every time they sped over a raised or mislaid cobblestone, he uttered a grimacing, ragged cry of pain….his clothing was gradually being shredded…one of his shoes was ripped off and shrank rapidly behind them. All the while, the barrel of the pistol waved back and forth, Connor's enraged face contorting with the effort of holding it steady.

Sweeney desperately began to weave the hansom left and right, steering the mare in sharp, serpentine swerves all over the road…Nellie and the others cried out in fear with every dangerous veer of the carriage, and Connor was dragged ludicrously back and forth like a limp sack…but _still _he kept his grip. His eyes were narrowed in a perpetual squint against the pebbles and bits of debris flying into his face, his teeth continually bared in a manic grimace, the cut at the corner of his mouth tingeing them with crimson. Sweeney narrowed his eyes at the Beadle, his mind racing frantically.

_DAMN IT! What should he do? What should he __**do**__??_

"HOWARD CONNOR!" a clear, piercing voice suddenly appeared. Sweeney whirled around and was shocked to see Daniel closing in on them, his hair whipping in the wind and his horse galloping for all it was worth.

"Howard Connor---you are under arrest!" Daniel shouted.

The Beadle craned his neck back, snarling like a savage beast. He swung the nose of the gun around to point squarely at the young officer. Sweeney seized in panic.

"_NO!"_

He immediately swerved the hansom, but it was too late.

_**PAAUUCCHH!**_

The most gruesome, haunting cry Sweeney had ever heard uttered by an animal screamed behind them like a siren. The front legs of Daniel's horse seemed to fold and collapse, and both he and it were sent sprawling to the ground, tumbling down in a spray of snow. Sweeney watched, horrified, from the corner of his eye as Daniel was thrown clear of the animal and somersaulted across the ground.

"DANIEL!" he screamed, his heart pounding…_no…no, no…NO!_

He felt the carriage veering again and looked back. _He couldn't stop…he couldn't shake the Beadle…what could he do? _

_What in God's name could he do??_

And then…suddenly…his mind stopped racing. All thought seemed to drain instantaneously from his head, leaving a still, stunned blankness…he stared forward, blinking, his eyes narrowed against the rushing, frigid wind.

All at once, he realized where they were.

Dunstan's Market, far away, looming a dozen blocks ahead of them like a great glass behemoth. Hodge's on their left. Pattison's on their right. The apothecary. The thread shop. The lawyer's office. _The cobbler, where years ago, little Eleanor Lovett had sat on the steps, shining her father's shoes._

Sweeney stared---the way one would stare at a ghost---at the dark, windowless pile of bricks that they were speeding rapidly towards. The charred, blackened doorframes. The gaping, empty walls, like toothless mouths, where wide panes of curtained glass had once hung. The painted gold letters, just barely legible through the burnt, ruined woodwork.

_Mrs. Lovett's Meat Pies._

He stared. The reins fell limp in his hands.

They were back.

Back in Fleet Street, once again.

Somewhere beneath him…almost too far for him to notice…he heard Beadle Connor speak the first distinguishable words he'd uttered since bursting demonically from the carriage house. His voice mirrored his madness…he screamed up to Sweeney like a raving lunatic.

"DIE, SWEENEY TODD! _**DIE**__!!!_"

_**PAAUUCCHH!**_

Sweeney's body jerked.

He stopped. His mouth opened, his eyes neither widening nor narrowing, but growing still and listless as he stared forward, his face frozen in shock. Everything all at once seemed to become quiet. His entire body was numb.

Slowly…he looked down. The reins slipped completely from his hands and the hansom careened in a wide, curving arch straight toward the corner of Fleet Street…the corner where sat the lonely, burned remains of what had once been their home.

Sweeney gaped down at his stomach uncomprehendingly. He lifted one shaking hand toward the small spot of blood, growing steadily larger as the red life seeped slowly from the bullet hole in his side. He held his palm inches above it, afraid to touch it and afraid not to. For one frozen, disbelieving instant, everything was a surreal blur.

Then, the pain hit.

The first voice that broke through his reeling consciousness was Nellie's.

She was screaming.

"SWEENEY!"

He looked up, dizzily, the world moving around him in a haze of fog. The corner was rushing towards them…no…it was already there.

"_WATCH OUT!!!"_

The horse whinnied, and with a mighty, final jerk, snapped through its leather harnessing and broke the hitching poles in two like they were twigs. Snorting wildly, it darted to the side and took off at a manic gallop down the street, disappearing around the corner, never to be seen again.

Before the impact, there was an instant of the serenest, most complete silence Sweeney had ever heard.

Then…

_CCCCKKKRRRAAASSHHH!_

The hansom swung into the brick corner of the pie shop, hitting it broadside at full speed. A deafening wooden _CRUNCH _rang in the air as the wooden wall of the carriage shattered into splinters. The body of the cab spun wildly around the corner, pivoting on its point of impact…Sweeney felt his neck crack with whiplash as he was jerked around so swiftly his eyes watered. He heard screams…screams, everywhere, he didn't know whose, he didn't know how many…and then, the world was spinning beneath him, the driver's seat of the hansom was falling away from his legs. For one instant he was suspended in the air, tossing, spinning…he heard the sound, like a wooden explosion, as the hansom at last overturned, landing on its side and skidding to a stop on the brick walk. He was rolling, bouncing…the hard pavement struck at his knees, his elbows, his chin, he could see nothing, everything was a blur around him…

And then, abruptly---as abruptly as it had begun---everything stopped. The silence returned.

Sweeney's eyes shot open.

He couldn't feel anything, any part of his body. He was so overcome with so many surges of pain from so many different places that they seemed to cancel each other out, muting his entire being into a floating, disconnected deadness.

He was lying flat on his back, his knees bent and his limbs sprawled in an awkward contortion. He blinked. The sky above him was a dark, washed out grey, rimmed at the edge of his vision with the roofline of the pie shop. The sun had risen to the east. Its first true rays of brilliant, searing white all at once struck his eyes, and he squinted. Slowly, struggling to regain his bearings and quell the hectic spinning in his head, he propped himself up on his elbows, and looked around. He was lying in the middle of the small little garden courtyard that had once, long ago, served as the outdoor seating section of Mrs. Lovett's pie shop.

For one still, panting moment, he just stared, squinting at the walls and the sun and the sky. And then…he saw the carriage. It was lying collapsed on its side, wheels spinning in the air, a shattered, splintered wreckage of its former self. He, being seated in the driver's perch and at a considerably higher height, had been thrown fifteen feet clear of the crash. The others, sheltered by the roof and walls, had not gone so far.

Sweeney blinked, his mouth open and haggard, choking breaths issuing through his ragged lungs. He could not feel the biting pain of the bullet lodged in his side, but he could feel the hot, rapidly chilling wetness of his blood as it oozed slowly from the hole. It stained the bricks beneath him, soaking his shirt and vest.

He stared at them, his body beginning to jerk and tremble as if in the earliest throes of a fit. He shook his head once back and forth, then rolled himself to his stomach, lifting to crawl on his hands and knees toward the ruined carriage around which they lay, sprawled together in a jumbled heap of arms and legs.

As he crawled, he shook his head.

_No._

_No. _

_**No**__. _

None of them moved. Anthony and Johanna were lying next to each other at the far left of the crash…Johanna was curled on her side, not having awakened once from her dead faint. Save for a series of ugly, jagged gauges down her cheek and forearm---out of which, at odd angles, stuck half a dozen large wooden splinters---she appeared to be uninjured. Her chest rose and fell in silent breathing.

Anthony was unconscious. He lay on his back beside her, blood trickling from a small wound on his right temple. His lips were parted and his face blank.

Nellie and Toby were entangled together…the former must have thrown herself protectively over the latter the moment before the crash. The boy was wrapped firmly in her arms, his body shielded by hers…he had not a scratch on him anywhere. As Sweeney drew nearer to them, Toby stirred, his eyes blinking open, his face pale with shock and fear. He looked around, breathing rapidly.

"_M-mum?" _he whispered, croaking hoarsely.

Sweeney shook his head.

_No._

Toby wriggled frantically out of her grasp, scrambling to his hands and knees to lean over her. Her took her by the shoulders and rolled her onto her back.

"Mum?!?" he repeated, his voice seizing in panic. "Mum! _Mum!! Wake up!"_

Sweeney at last came to them. He fumbled to a halt beside Toby, wheezing and choking…he pressed his hand to the hole in his side, futilely trying to staunch the blood flow. Toby's eyes widened and his face blanched with horror.

"Dad!!" he cried tearfully, torn--as if he didn't know whose shoulders to steady first, his, or Nellie's. He stared at Sweeney's stomach, his eyes wide with fear. "Dad, you're…y-you're…"

He broke into helpless silence. Sweeney didn't look at him. He leaned over Nellie, his face frozen in pain and disbelief.

Her eyes were closed. Her face was blank, her hair fanned loosely over half of it. Her legs twisted at odd angles under her torn skirts, her good foot still stuck in a corner of the wreckage of the hansom.

Sweeney stared down at her. He couldn't move. He couldn't feel anything. Somewhere, deep inside, something was screaming at him to take her, to hold her…to do _something…_but he was paralyzed.

He could do nothing…except stare.

His face was as still and frozen as a statue…save for the light quivering in his black eyes…as he opened his mouth and whispered, quietly.

"_Nellie."_

She didn't move.

Wincing, ignoring the pain, he lifted his right hand, pressing harder against the hole with his left, and gently shook her by the shoulder.

"_Nellie."_

Nothing. She lay there, as blank and serene as…as…

_No._

_Just…no._

Stiffly, unthinkingly…as if he were in a dream…Sweeney bent forward, closed his eyes, and kissed her still lips.

He heard Toby sniffling beside him.

He pulled back six inches, his eyes desperately scanning her face for any signs of movement.

"Nellie," he whispered, with a calmness that he didn't possess. "Nellie. Please wake up."

The rays of dawning sunlight shone down on them will full brightness now. They lit her pale face, washing her skin in gold.

Gently, tremblingly…Sweeney cupped her face with his hand. His voice shook.

"_Please wake up."_

For another instant…for another eternity…nothing.

_Thud. Thud. Thud._

His heart pounded slowly. His lips threatened to tremble.

_Thud. Thud._

Then…brown. Faint, half-lidded, shining pools of the deepest brown…the most weary, beautiful thing in the world.

Her eyes fluttered open. Slowly, blinking, they opened all the way.

And the instant they were…her face contorted into a terrified, wide-eyed scream.

"BE'IND YOU!!!"

Sweeney spun around…and looked straight into the black, hollow barrel of a revolver.

_Chick. _Connor cocked it, the nose pointed less than an inch away, smack between Sweeney's eyes…and smiled.

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

Connor had heard, rather than seen, the crash.

The instant before the impact, he had abruptly loosened his grip on the rail, his fingers slipping away from it and his body skidding to an immediate halt on the cobblestones. He had rolled to his side, contorting for a few seconds in the agonizing pain---his leg was almost beyond feeling, the entire front of his body was racked with searing burns and bleeding gauges from being dragged for so long…his clothing torn, each of his buttons disappeared---and he heard it…the crash, bursting through the dawn with a shattering wooden explosion.

By the time he looked up, the hansom was overturned, dashed beyond recognition, two wheels spinning in the air. Everything immediately became eerily still.

For a long, paralyzed moment, Connor simply stared, his chest heaving as he painfully propped himself to a sitting position. His fingers shook around the handle of the gun. His eyes darted wildly, the whites visible in a complete ring of leering insanity. He thought no human thoughts. He had forgotten the House of Records, the other constables, Judge Turpin, his brother, the offices of Scotland Yard, his position, his protocol…even his name. He had forgotten everything. He knew only one thing.

With the crazed, senseless bloodlust of rabid animal, he dragged himself to his feet. His right leg constricted in such blind, searing pain, he buckled, grinding his teeth, and nearly fell…but he forced himself to stagger forward, limping across the walk and around the wreck of the hansom.

There…he saw them. All of them, lying there together…and the boy kneeling beside the woman.

He didn't care about them. He had forgotten who they were. He saw only one person…one face, burning in his eyes with a hatred so dark it physically ached.

He limped toward the crouched figure of Sweeney Todd. He lifted the gun in his trembling arm. Mrs. Lovett's scream barely registered in his mind…it didn't matter. So much the better, because it made Todd turn to look at him…that way, he'd be able to see the look on his face…to relish the divine, exquisite bliss of Todd's dying expression as his brains were blown all over the pavement.

_Chick. _The gun cocked calmly in his hand. He smiled.

_Goodbye._

_Goodbye forever…Mr. Sweeney Todd._

His finger squeezed…the trigger creaked, folding halfway, a hair breadth away from ending the wretched, inhuman devil's life once and for all…

Todd's eyes widened. The light of the dawning sunlight shone into them, illuminating the soulless black orbs so brightly that they were lit with a tint of what almost looked like brown.

Connor froze.

His finger halted in a cold, dead stop with the trigger half-pulled.

The hand that held the gun began to shake. The tremor traveled up his arm, coursing through his body until it had seized his entire being with the most violent, horrified trembling he had ever experienced.

The Beadle couldn't speak. His jaw worked soundlessly. He couldn't form coherent thoughts. His mind melted into a jumble of images and memories.

Todd stared up at him, with that _face…that __**face**__…those __**eyes**__…_

Connor heard someone sigh…a long, low, defeated whimper, so resigned and miserable, it would have brought tears to any listener's eye. Then he realized that it was he who had made it.

_The eyes…the horrible, horrible eyes…_

He knew those eyes.

He had seen them once before…once…oh, so very long before.

"_To this day, I take great pride in the fact that it was my…__**forceful**__, coaxing, that garnered from this man his full confession." _

The nose of the gun dropped down from between Todd's eyes, pointing at the ground, trembling so fiercely in Connor's grasp that it clicked…slowly, expressionlessly, Todd rose to his feet and they stared at each other, face to face…_those eyes…._

"_And do you know who that criminal father __**was**__, Mrs. Lovett?"_

Connor's mouth hung open. His insides had turned to water. His vision was blurring, and he blinked…he realized that his eyes were wet with strange, inexplicable tears.

"_You have to live…" Sweeney Todd had said to him, towering over him, that infuriating combination of pity and disgust in his eyes, "…so that someday, soon…you will realize what you are." _

Connor watched as Todd's hand slowly, cautiously, slipped to his side, to rest over the gleaming razor at his hip.

"_Because that…will be the worst punishment of all."_

_The worst punishment…_

"…_do you know who that criminal father __**was, **__Mrs. Lovett? He was a man named…"_

Connor squinted his eyes against the sun…and the eyes burned into his soul.

"…_a man named…"_

"Benjamin Barker," he whispered.

_Snick. _Todd lifted the razor from its holster and flipped it open, holding it out, ready in defense.

Connor barely noticed. The eyes remained locked in his mind's eye, but everything else had disappeared…the street, the ruined carriage, Mrs. Lovett…everything had vanished.

_He was in a small, stately room, trembling before the deans of admission. He was running down the street as fast as his legs would carry him, trying to drown out the screams of the woman whom he'd abandoned to a mugger. He was twisting a piece of paper between his hands, teeth grinding in suppressed rage as an officer in the room next to him sang "Howard the Coward, Howard the Coward" to a chorus of raucously laughing constables. He was at his father's deathbed, blinking with disbelief, and certain that he must have heard wrong, when his father's dying words were, "Charles…I want you to have the ring."_

_He was lost._

_Lost….in those horrible, horrible eyes…_

…_forever._

"…_someday, soon…you will realize what you are." _

Howard Connor's eye twitched.

And slowly…for the last time…he smiled, because in that single instant…lost in those eyes, the eyes of Sweeney Todd…the eyes of _Benjamin Barker…_he had finally gotten it. The joke. The joke that had followed him, like a shadow, every moment since the day he had been born.

The great joke…_his life._

_You will realize what you are._

_And you, Howard Connor, are a sadist. And a fool. And a coward. And a joke._

_And a monster._

_You, Howard Connor, are…._

"A failure," he whispered.

He smiled.

He lifted the gun up to point at Todd's face.

Todd knocked it away as it fired uselessly into the air.

The last thing Howard Connor saw was his own smiling, bleeding, mustached face, reflected in the silver blade of the razor…and, in that fleeting instant, he strangely had to admit to himself…that never in his life had he seen a smile more serene…or more horrible.

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

Sweeney Todd, for the very first time in his life…missed.

Intentionally.

He did not slice Beadle Connor's throat. He sliced approximately four inches above it.

The blade of the razor was dull, heavy with dried blood and nicked in a few places…it didn't cut through Connor's mouth cleanly. It dig, twisting, wrenching, pulling, and at last snapped through his second cheek with a sickening, cleaving _pop._

Blood splattered across Sweeney's eyes. He blinked, his breath weak and trembling…his arm outstretched in the direction that he'd slashed, he stumbled back from Connor, shaking, heaving…and just the slightest bit afraid.

The blade of the razor had entered at the left corner of Connor's mouth and exited through the right. It had sliced clear through each wall of tissue, carving his mouth into a gaping, unholy grin, the flesh curling back and weeping copious amounts blood. Every one of Connor's teeth was exposed, straight through to the back of his mouth. His eyes lolled in his head…he fell slowly forward onto his knees, then to all fours. His body convulsed once…he vomited blood in a dripping pool onto the cobblestones…then collapsed in a cold faint.

_But he was not dead. _

Sweeney stared down at him, pressing his mouth closed and breathing heavily through his nose. His heart was racing. He noticed something in the corner of his eye, and glanced down at it. He recoiled, backing further away, his face again twisting in an odd combination of horror and fascination. A little pink chunk of flesh sat quiet and unassuming on the ground. Sweeney peered at it for a full five seconds before realizing what it was…it was the tip of Connor's tongue, severed clean out of his mouth.

Sweeney turned away, gazing down at the ground. The razor dropped from his hand and clattered onto the stones. He walked back to where Nellie and Toby huddled together beside the hansom and dropped down to his knees.

His mind…strangely…was calm, and perfectly clear. He almost felt like smiling.

He had no thoughts at all, save for one, and it repeated over and over in a slow, gentle whisper.

_It's over._

Everything began to grow dark. He blinked, a thick dizziness suddenly stealing over him. He looked down at his abdomen, lifting his hand from the bullet wound. His palm was red. His clothes were so saturated with blood, it was almost hard to tell where the hole was.

He heard Nellie and Toby's muffled voices in his ears, but he couldn't tell what it was they were saying.

"Nellie," he muttered, a half-smile tilting on his face, as he sat down beside them, not quite feeling Toby's hands on his shoulders, or Nellie's palms cupping his face.

"Nellie," he said weakly, his voice failing as he leaned back, laying down flat on the pavement. "Nellie…_it's over."_

It sounded like she was saying his name, and crying, but he couldn't entirely tell. Everything was dark now, and spinning…his eyes fluttered as his body spread limp and still over the ground, the wound in his side pulsing in a dull, aching throb. Toby had one hand on his chest now, the other on his shoulder, shaking him frantically.

"_Dad! Dad! DAD!" _

The boy's voice faded into silence.

Someone new was stumbling towards them…he could just barely make them out through his blurry vision. He couldn't be sure, but he thought---he thought---it looked like Daniel.

Those were Nellie's lips on his forehead, her tears mingling against his skin.

He was smiling…softly…as he slipped into the blissful quiet of unconsciousness.

A/N; And there it is. Hope it didn't disappoint! Reviews make me smile ( but only in the non-creepy, face-still-intact way )!


	36. Chapter 36

A/N; Agggh! _Finally! _I've had this finished since yesterday, but haven't been able to post it since the login server was down! Argh. So frustrating. Anyway...WHOO! Give it up for completion of all major outstanding homework assignments!! Of course, I'm sure it's only a matter of time until _more _are piled on…_…but still, I at least found the time to finally finish chapter 36! Hope you like it!

Disclaimer; I don't own Sweeney Todd, and neither do you. But it's 1:15 in the morning, and I can't think of a single witticism or cute rhyming couplet to soften the blow. So let's just stand around and look sad for a while. O_O

Chapter 36

_Wait, Love, Wait_

or

_Rest, Soon…Forever_

He woke up, once---briefly---to the sight of piercing lights and faces hidden in white masks.

It was like a dream, and it was over too quickly for him to even be sure it had actually happened…but vague snatches of memory lingered through the dark haziness in his mind…small, jarring eclipses of reality.

His eyelids fluttered wildly…he was so unbelievably overcome with drowsiness---it hung, heavily, like a tangible burden all around him…he lifted his head a few inches, and it felt as if it weighed a hundred pounds. He glanced down the length of his own body---he was lying on his back, with the bright lights above him and the three or four masked faces circled around him. He narrowed his eyes blearily. He was shirtless, and there was a quantity of brilliant crimson smeared over the skin of his stomach. Hands, gloved fingers, were pressing him in half a dozen places at once.

He was almost completely numb from the neck down, and could feel nothing but a strange, suspended dullness---but it appeared, to his glazed and squinting eyes, that there was a fist sized hole sliced cleanly in his right side, and that one of the men in white was probing five inches into it with long metal instruments.

Sweeney groaned slightly, not out of pain, but a dazed, sleepy confusion.

He just then became aware of the hard, urgent voices all around him, because as soon as he made a sound, they abruptly paused, every masked face turning to pin him with baited stares. There was a second of still silence…his eyes lolled in their sockets and his head sank back like dead weight onto the pillow.

_Bloody…mad…what in the…_

His scrambled thoughts stumbled disjointedly along like a cart missing a wheel.

"He's coming to," an authoritative male voice barked somewhere in the midst of the haze. "More anesthetic."

Sweeney saw the flash of the needle, but didn't feel it's penetration. Darkness swooped over him like a blanket of lead, and he had passed out again before he could so much as wonder what was happening.

The next time he awoke, he was no longer numb. He _wished _he was numb.

"M-Mr. Todd? M-Mr…T-Todd?"

The voice seemed to come from far away…its bashful stutter was at once both foreign and strikingly familiar to him. Everything was dark, and soft, and too warm. A thin film of sweat clung to his skin.

Sweeney groaned deep in his throat, opening his eyes the narrowest crack possible, his face lining in a deep squint. Gone were the blaring lights and white coats…the place he lay in now was comfortably dim, dusty in the faint glow of impending twilight streaming through the very large windows, and lit with a number of bedside kerosene lamps. But it was much _too warm. _Sweeney grunted softly, lifting himself into a sitting position. He discovered, firstly, that he was laying in a small bed, a broad, lumpy pillow propped up behind his shoulders, and blankets tangled over his legs…and that he was wearing strange clothes that weren't at all his own; a thin pair of long, plain, cotton pants, and absolutely no shirt to speak of.

Upon trying to sit upright, he discovered, secondly, that his entire torso was stiff with a throbbing, aching pain that seemed to radiate out from his stomach muscles and course through every fiber of his upper body. He sat up, and stopped abruptly as the pain immediately paralyzed him…wincing, opening his eyes a bit further, he growled softly and leaned back against the pillow again. He turned his head, and caught a glimpse of his face in a small, dirty mirror sitting on the table beside his bed…for one moment, he stared at it in stunned astonishment. The face he saw looking back at him was a barely recognizable stranger.

Sweeney's already wild hair had taken on a practically animalistic spray, and unless he was mistaken, the white streak at the crown of his head had spread faintly, more gray hairs cropping up around it. He had always been pale---ghostly, undeniably pale---but now, his skin appeared to have literally taken on a glow of translucence, and the dark circles beneath his eyes looked almost black in comparison. His sideburns had become wildly overgrown, and begun to creep stealthily down his jaw line, forming a dark shadow of unshaven stubble. His face was bruised in half a dozen places…the worst injury by far, however, was to the bridge of his nose. Undoubtedly the Beadle had broken it with his fist…a dark mottling of red and purple spread between his eyes, still swollen just faintly…a blood-marked bandage was taped across the bridge. He blinked at the strange face in the mirror. It was the face of a starved, beaten, half-forgotten memory.

Blinking, his hands fumbling clumsily for some reason, Sweeney threw the blanket off his torso and looked down at what seemed to be at least a mile of white gauze wound tightly around his middle. The bandaging covered his stomach completely and looped several times up over his shoulder…on his lower right side, a splotch of fresh blood had already begun to seep through the dressing. He stared at it curiously, his hand hovering over it and feeling it gingerly, the red not quite wet enough to come off on his fingertips. He also noticed, in looking down at it, that the shards of glass had been removed from his knuckles, and that his right hand was so bound with bandages he could scarcely move his fingers.

"Ah…you'll, ah…you'll l-likely need that…ch-changed again, before…b-before the night's out, Mr. Todd."

Sweeney looked up. His eyes widened, his lips parted minutely…yet, he was honestly not surprised at all to see Daniel Northing sitting there beside the bed.. His mind was still too thick and dazed to feel true alarm or excitement. Instead, he simply blinked, and muttered in a low voice, hoarse and guttural from hours of disuse and sleep.

"Daniel."

The young officer smiled almost shyly, quickly averting his eyes.

"Good…g-good to…to see you awake, Mr…Mr. T-Todd."

Sweeney blinked again. Everything was moving too quickly, and yet at the same time he felt stuck in a daze of slow-motion. He looked back down again at his bandaged torso, and suddenly winced as he felt a surge of dull pain welling in the structure of his face. He tried to sit fully upright again, but was stopped by a cool hand on his shoulder…he glanced up sharply to see Daniel half risen from his chair beside the bed, an apologetic look on his face.

"Oh, you…ah…p-please, Mr. Todd, I…I think you want to lay down a b-bit longer, yet."

Sweeney allowed himself to be eased back onto the pillow, but he stared at Daniel with a narrow, confused expression.

"We're in a hospital," he said blankly.

Daniel nodded, fidgeting with the blue cap of his uniform in his hands. "Y-yes, sir. I got you here as soon as I…p-possibly could. I was a…a-f-fraid, you might be…you might…well, you---you see, we had to wait, until the other officers g-got there…came following the sound of the…the c-crash, you see…and I had to explain to them what had…what had h-happened, and by the time C-Connor was t-taken away…"

As he listened, dimly, to Daniel's voice, Sweeney had been slowly surveying the enormous room in which they sat…it ran a great deal on to the left and right of him, and on either side there were dozens and dozens of beds exactly like his, each stationed with a single chair and little bedside table on which sat a lamp and brown bottles of nasty, acrid-looking fluids. The smell of the room was warm and sickly, an almost yellowish smell…the stagnant air was calm and fairly quiet, but beneath it there was a low, perpetual undertone of coughing and moaning, and every few minutes one could detect the unmistakable sound of someone retching nearby. Nurses in dingy white hospital uniforms were moving briskly up and down the aisles between the beds. For a moment Sweeney was distracted with taking in the jarring details of the strange place he'd woken up in, but the instant Connor's name slipped into Daniel's voice, he turned abruptly, his eyes alert and open.

"Connor," he parroted, interrupting him, a minute portion of the strength returning to his voice. He propped himself up higher with his arms, looking Daniel straight in the eye. "Where is he? What happened?"

Daniel started, fumbling and dropping his hat on the floor. He blinked, clearing his throat as if to find his place again.

"Beadle Connor, he…ah, well, that is to say---he's not exactly _Beadle_ Connor, anymore, but---he…ah…Mr. C-Connor, that is…he's been arrested, Mr. Todd."

Sweeney stared. It was strange…save for a dim, calculating astonishment, he felt almost no emotion at the statement. His face was blank.

"Arrested…on what charge?"

Daniel's eyes widened incredulously. "On what---on charge of attempted _murder, _Mr. Todd!"

Sweeney only blinked. "Attempted murder."

"Yes, sir! Of you and Mrs. Lovett and…and all the others! I mean, that's…that's the charge he was _taken away _on, at least…as soon as he's patched up and his case is looked into, there'll be _plenty _of other charges to account for, let me assure you. This arrest is just the beginning, Mr. Todd…there will be _scores _of inquiries made…and we have witnesses, good, honest policeman who will testify against him…torture, perjury, unauthorized searches, _illegal arrests…_and most of all, the matter of the girl he killed in an investigation last year…_everything _will be looked into, Mr. Todd, there won't be a stone left unturned…"

Daniel was gradually working himself up into a fervor of excitement, his eyes flashing eagerly with youth and sincerity. Sweeney narrowed his eyes thoughtfully at him, studying every exuberant contour of his face as he talked. In some ways, Daniel reminded him of Anthony…in others, he was like no man he'd ever met before.

Not so very long ago, Sweeney would have called him a fool. A poor, naïve, deluded fool. But now, as he looked into those hazel eyes…those eyes so completely devoid of malice, devoid of bitterness, gleaming with nothing but the light of a pure, unadulterated thirst for justice_…_not for vengeance, not for retribution, not for punishment_…_but simply for plain, noble, _justice…_

_It will be a man far better than me, Mr. Connor, who brings you to the fate you deserve._

His face made no movement, showed no sign of emotion…but on the inside---perhaps, not even so very far on the inside---Sweeney was smiling softly.

"…he'llbe made to answer for all the horrible things he's done…and without Judge Turpin to protect him, this time, he'll have no escape! After all these years, he'll _finally_ have to face his consequences!"

His inner smile bled just close enough to the surface for Sweeney's eyes to change, and some of the sharp lines in his brow to soften minutely.

"You're not stuttering, Daniel."

The officer froze on the verge of a sentence with his mouth open, immediately remembering his shyness and dropping his gaze down to stare once more at his hands as they kneaded restlessly in his cap.

"Ah…aha, well…it, ah…it c-comes and it g-goes…M-Mr. Todd."

Sweeney smiled…just the slightest bit.

_A man far better than me._

They sat in silence for a few moments, during which Sweeney again felt the warmth of the blankets and the closeness of the air starting to stifle him. He shuffled the covers off of his legs, remarking humorously to himself, with an ironic tilt to his mouth, that he had practically forgotten what it meant to actually be _too warm. _It seemed he'd felt nothing but wind and cold for ages upon ages. Daniel cleared his throat.

"I…ah…I arranged for t-two private rooms for you, Mr. Todd…police authority, and all…but they n-needed to g-get that bullet out as soon as p-possible, and since you were already anesthetized…they th-though it best, if you stayed where you were…until you woke up, I mean. If…ah…if you're f-feeling up to it, I could ask to have you taken…t-taken upstairs, to see the others…?"

_Others._

Sweeney froze in mid-motion, the blankets clutched in his fist, his other arm awkwardly propping up his stiff torso. He stared at Daniel, his heart jumping from a slow thumping to a wild throb in seconds. A thousand memories and fears raced through his mind…faces, voices, splinters of wood, bleeding wounds…but through it all, one name stood out from the fray, burning urgently like a brand across his mind. Without a single word of warning, he reached out and grabbed Daniel by the shirt front, pulling him towards him with desperate, pleading eyes. The officer started in shock and dropped his cap to the floor. Sweeney's voice seethed out in a faint, pained, whisper.

"Where is she? _Where's Mrs. Lovett?"_

Daniel blinked, his lips hovering.

"She's…she's in her own room, on the…the s-second floor…I g-got one for you, and one f-for the H-Hopes…"

"_What room?" _Sweeney demanded, pulling the young man closer.

Daniel swallowed thickly. "R-Room…two hundred…th-thirteen…but, Mr. Todd…"

Sweeney instantly let go. Daniel dropped back into the chair, his eyes blank and curious…but the next moment, they widened with alarm as he sprang to his feet, hands outstretched.

"Mr. Todd, _wait! _You're not ready to---!"

But Sweeney had already leapt up from the bed, the springs creaking sharply as his bare feet banged on the wooden floor…he hadn't taken three steps before a swoon of the most staggering weakness he'd ever felt stopped him dead in his tracks, crippling him with dizziness. His head swimming, the breath catching abruptly in his throat, his eyes widened as he felt himself pitching forward, the floor rushing up at him…he heard the chair knocking backward, and caught just a glimpse of Daniel's face as the young man darted forward and managed to catch him before he fell.

"_Oof!"_

Sweeney gasped, seizing hold of Daniel's arms to steady himself. He blinked, his chest nearly heaving, his head spinning from the surge of overwhelming frailty. He had never felt such unbelievable weakness in his life…it was if every ounce of energy had been sapped from his body, leaving him with barely the strength to stand up.

Daniel held him tightly, muttering small sounds of embarrassment as he awkwardly moved to drape Sweeney's arm over his shoulders and wrap his own securely around his back and beneath the other. Sweeney blinked, mouth open, staring down at the floor, vainly willing the room to stop spinning.

"I _tried _to warn you!" Daniel said, his voice half-chuckling. "Do you have _any _idea how much blood you've lost, Mr. Todd? You'll be lucky if you can walkby_ tomorrow!_"

Sweeney groaned faintly, holding his head with one hand, wincing against the taut pull of the stitched wound in his side.

"Take me to her," he wheezed, infuriated with his own weakness when Nellie was so close, _waiting _for him… "Please…take me to her, Daniel…"

The officer's smile dropped. He nodded solemnly.

"Of…of c-course, Mr. Todd." He turned and signaled to a nurse passing by, asking if her if they could please have a clean shirt for his friend.

Fifteen long, agonizing minutes later, they were shuffling slowly down a long, narrow corridor lined on either side with door after door after door of small, shut-up chambers. So few people were able to afford private rooms in the hospital that the hallway was almost totally silent…save for one or two nurses passing calmly up and down the floor, the passage was virtually deserted.

Sweeney's bare feet made soft, limping pattering sounds as he hobbled along, leaning against Daniel like a crutch, his head spinning with dizziness with every gimpy step they took. It was _maddening…_there was no other word for it. Sweeney ground his teeth in frustration, his arm gripped around Daniel's neck for dear life, the thin, too-large cotton nightshirt dampened faintly with sweat, even though it was less than half-buttoned over his chest. It had taken them ages to make it up the winding corridor stairs…Sweeney had been hot and out of breath after half a flight. _How long was he going to be so pitifully weak?_

But at long last, they reached it…room two hundred and thirteen. The numbers were marked out in chipping gold paint on the dark wooden door.

"H-here we are, Mr. Todd," Daniel said, trying to sound cheerful, but Sweeney could sense the tired sigh in his voice. _Poor boy…he'd been through so much, put himself in so much danger for their sakes…_

"Thank you," Sweeney muttered quietly beneath his breath, his voice low with embarrassment. "I…can go on from here."

Daniel frowned, clearly unconvinced. "Mr. Todd, are you _sure?"_

Sweeney winced, clenching his jaw as he jerkily extricated himself from the officer's grasp. His balance swayed dangerously as he planted both feet firmly on the floor…Daniel's hands rose to steady him, but he waved him away with a finite gesture, squeezing his eyes shut for a moment until the floor stopped turning.

"Yes," he mumbled, taking the door knob and bracing himself on it. The brass was pleasantly cool in his fist.

Daniel's shoulders dropped, his eyes weary, but resigned.

"If…if you're sure, Mr. Todd. But please, do be careful."

Sweeney nodded. Daniel looked at him a moment longer, a quiet, honest expression on his face…then, with a final nod, he turned to go.

He had gotten five steps away when Sweeney jerked his head up and called after him.

"Daniel," he heard himself say, loudly, suddenly.

He turned to look back.

"Yes Mr. Todd?"

Sweeney's mouth hung slightly open for a moment. He stared at the young man, his body leaning forward against the door, his mind racing, and abruptly blank. A moment of still, wordless silence passed between them.

_How can I…how can I ever possibly…?_

"I…I want to…thank you," Sweeney uttered softly, his own voice strange and hollow-sounding. "Daniel…I…I want to, but I don't…I don't know…"

To his immense relief, the young constable only smiled understandingly.

"No. I want to thank _you, _Mr. Todd."

Sweeney stared speechlessly. It had taken nothing less than a miracle---an honest to God miracle---for him to be able to bring himself to believe it again…but he had.

_There truly are good people left in the world, yet._

Daniel only smiled at his mute gaze. He tilted his head in the direction of the door.

"Go. She's waiting, Mr. Todd."

He turned, and disappeared around the corner. Sweeney watched the place where he had gone for another few seconds….he felt…he was _sure…_there was something more he wanted to say….but at that moment, he just couldn't decipher what it was.

And then…slowly---yet not slowly at all…he turned, and was face to face with the peeling _213._

He suddenly heard a faint, almost imperceptible rattling sound…he glanced down, and realized that it was his hand trembling on the doorknob. He gripped it with both hands, closing his eyes and forcing his breath to steady. His limbs were still weak and exhausted…he was almost already beginning to regret asking Daniel to leave before he'd helped him into the room…but there was no going back now.

_And Mrs. Lovett…_

…_Nellie…__**his **__Nellie…._

"_She's waiting, Mr. Todd."_

_Click. _The doorknob turned abruptly in his hands, the lock jerking noisily open. He froze, his heart throbbing wildly, peering into the room through a thin crack of glowing, golden light. The room inside was utterly silent. His pulse pounded. His palms sweat as he gripped the brass doorknob for dear life. His eyes burned through the crack down on the bare floor inside.

_Why was he making this so difficult?? Go to her! Go to her, you stupid---_

"'Ello? Who's there?"

His eyes popped open. The small, timid voice cut through his inexplicable anxiety, draining from him every thought except those of his family. Without another second's hesitation he swung open the door, bracing himself with one hand on the frame and staggering one footstep over the threshold. The door bounced lightly off of the wall inside with a smart, resonating _bang._

Sweeney's face blanked into a soft, emotionless stare.

The room was small, scarcely large enough for one window, a straight-backed chair, a single bed, and a nightstand. The cheap, translucent curtains were half-drawn over the glass, but the last rays of goldenrod twilight were still beaming in over the dirty rooftops, casting shadows across the floor. The kerosene lamp beside the bed was lit, illuminating the pale faces of the room's two occupants.

Toby's wide, rounded eyes stared, for one moment, into his deep black ones. The boy sat on the edge of the bed, one of his hands laid across Nellie's forearm.

Sweeney had just turned to glance his eyes toward his sleeping love, when his attention was immediately yanked back to Toby.

"_DAD!" _the boy hissed at the top of a shrill, barely-contained whisper of excitement.

Sweeney's eyes widened…_Bloody hell…_

"Toby, _wait, _just one_---ooof!!"_

It was St. Peter's all over again…except that this time, instead of working up a running start, Toby crossed the room in two short bounds and pounced on him like a cat rather than a charging bull…_so much the better, _Sweeney winced, looking down at the scrawny boy latched in a vice-like grip around him…_any harder and the damn stitches would have torn open…_

Toby had evidently not noticed Sweeney's sharp intake of breath and soft gasps of pain…he was too busy hugging the living daylights out of him and muttering a continual stream of joyful, breathless chatter, the side of his head pressed close over Sweeney's heart.

"Oh, Dad, I was so scared! _We _were so scared…we didn' know where they took you, we didn' know if you were alright or if you'd died, or, or _anythin'…_but you didn', Dad, you're alright, you're al_right! _They didn' tell us a bloody thing, they shut us up 'ere early this mornin', as soon as mum 'ad been taken care of, an' all they said 'fore they took you away was they 'ad to get the bullet out o' your guts, an'….Dad, _did _they get the bullet out o' your guts? Are you goin' t'be alright, now?"

Sweeney clenched his teeth, patting Toby gingerly on the back and struggling with all his might not to curse.

"Toby…son…" he ground out, flinching as the wound in his side constricted beneath the boy's squeezing grasp, "…could you…_let go?"_

Toby started, looking down and instantly jumping back, the smile vanishing from his face. He stared in a wide-eyed mixture of fascination and horror at Sweeney's bandaged torso…he leaned closer until his face was inches from the wound, peering curiously at the dried bloodstain. His eyes turned guiltily up to Sweeney's face.

"I'm sorry! I---I didn' know, I didn' see---"

Sweeney attempted to smile, but only got as far as a thin grimace. He leaned heavily against the doorframe, spreading his hand over Toby's scruffy head.

"That's…alright, son," he muttered, cutting him off. Toby gazed mournfully at him for another moment, but couldn't help himself from drifting back into a broad, jubilant smile.

"I knew you'd make it, Dad," he whispered softly. "I knew you wouldn' leave us all alone."

Sweeney looked down at him, and the scowl of pain melted from his features as he realized that the gleam shining in Toby's eyes was a light of adoration. For another moment, he was paralyzed in the young, innocent glow of those brown eyes…_the eyes of his son._

Sweeney's face softened. A strange kind of thickness was building in his throat. Slowly, gently, he ruffled his fingers through the boy's hair, and felt something almost close to a smile spreading across his face.

"No," he said quietly. "I would never leave you all alone."

Toby's teeth flashed in a wide grin…then, all at once, without warning, the happiness drained from his face and he cast a concerned glance back to the bed.

"She's been asleep all day, Dad," he reported worriedly, breaking from Sweeney's grasp and moving back to kneel down at the bedside. "She 'asn't woke up _once _since they laid 'er there."

Sweeney looked up…and for the first time, he truly saw her.

An unexpected wave of emotion, stronger than the pain in his side, even stronger than the weakness in his limbs, swept over him like a tide, crippling him. He fell against the doorframe, holding it with both hands, his face wrought in an expression lost somewhere between sorrow and sheer, unbridled ecstasy at seeing her again.

He couldn't move. He hung there, silent, staring at her, until Toby glanced back at him curiously. The boy's face blanched.

"Dad? What's wrong?"

Sweeney's jaw worked soundlessly for a split second. When he at last found his voice, it issued forth in a hushed, choked whisper he had not anticipated.

"T---Toby," he muttered, his fingers gripping the wood for dear life. He tried to swallow and found that his throat was thick and impassable. "Toby, could…could you…leave us, for a moment?"

For a fleeting instant, the boy looked hurt, and as if he wanted to protest…then, a look of understanding passed across his face and he seemed to realize what was happening. Gravely, lights of concern still glowing in his eyes, he nodded and rose slowly to his feet.

"Yes, sir. I'll…I'll go in Anthony's room."

He turned, and opened a door in the wall opposite the bed that Sweeney had not noticed before, darting through it to the conjoined room beside them, his face hovering in the crack for just a moment before closing it gently.

The floor and walls passing numbly around him, Sweeney broke away from the frame, stumbling a few unfeeling steps forward and fumbling behind him to shut the door. He couldn't tear his eyes away from her. He couldn't stop the hot waves of emotion swelling behind his eyes, the deep, aching throb of his heart, so strong it seemed to push him stumblingly forward with every pulsing beat, lending strength to his strength-less body. Before he knew he had moved, he had fallen into the chair beside the bed, leaning forward and fisting his hands in the soft comforter as he gazed unblinkingly down at her.

Nellie was asleep, curled peacefully on her side, the covers pulled up past her chin and revealing only a small glimpse of her calm, heart-shaped face. Her hair had been washed and combed, and had dried into wild sprays of copper and auburn ringlets fanned out over the pillow. Without realizing it Sweeney lifted his hand to run one of the tresses between his fingers. It was coarse and soft at the same time, like downy wool, and curly as a spring…not the slightest bit the way he remembered Lucy's hair. _Not the slightest bit…_

His face was as still as a statue, and yet at the same time he felt as if he was trembling.

_Just look…look how beautiful she is._

All of the blood had been washed from her face and body…her pale, milk-white skin shone luminescent in the warm light of the lamp, marred here and there by the purple marks of her bruises. One cut on her forehead had needed a few small stitches, and one on her cheekbone was bandaged. Her enormous eyes, closed, the lids smooth and rounded like worn white pebbles on the beach, her red-tinted eyelashes folded down like wings, her full lips parted ever so slightly. Her back rose and fell gently as the breath ebbed in and out of her like an ocean tide…he closed his eyes for a moment, and heard it…the soft, almost imperceptible rattle of her delicate snoring. If he'd been able, he would have smiled.

_He was going to love that sound._

His hand reached out to touch her face, and all at once he was torn horribly between the irrepressible urge to hold her in his arms, and the bitter displeasure at the thought of rousing her from such a peaceful sleep.

_How long had it been since she'd slept…truly, honestly, __**slept**__?_

_Nellie…he'd put her through so much…_

For a long, still moment---he didn't know how long…it might have been a minute, it might have been an hour---he just sat there, leaning over her bedside, his fingers running through the loose strands of her wild hair.

At last, when he finally didn't think he could bear it another moment, he gently laid his hand over her shoulder to nudge her awake…but the instant before he did, her eyelids suddenly fluttered of their own volition. He froze, less than twelve inches separating their faces, his eyes wide and his heart pounding…he watched, still as a statue, as the deep, liquid chocolate eyes slowly opened, her lids hanging slack and heavy with sleep.

She frown, the lines creasing in her face. _Tired, careworn lines. Lucy had never had those._

_They were beautiful._

For a long, suspended moment, she stared at him, her eyes narrowed and groggy, as if she didn't recognize him. She blinked, closed her eyes, extricated her hand from the blankets to massage her tear ducts. She opened her eyes again, blinked twice…she spoke, and the hoarse, throaty rattle of her voice was like the gentle ringing of a bell far, far away in the distance of his mind. The lump in his throat doubled in size.

Her frown smoothed away into a calm, emotionless gaze.

"It's you, love," she said plainly.

Something inside Sweeney burst…something that he couldn't contain for another instant if he tried. He leaned forward and rested his forehead against hers, holding the side of her head in his hand and burying his fingers in her hair. His chest heaved, and a strange guttural sound moved deep in his chest, and he realized that his eyes were blurry with tears.

Tears. And the strangest thing of all was that he didn't try in the slightest to conceal them.

"It's me," he echoed, his voice seizing and jerking as he almost sobbed.

_My God…my God…_

…_my love….me, loving again._

And there was nothing else to be said about it.

He felt the soft touch of her hand on the side of his face. His slid his fingers from her hair and held it, pressed against his cheek. For a long moment they huddled there, together, their faces beside each other in the wet, hot, gasping shadow.

"Love," she whispered.

He pulled back, the air cool on his damp face. He wore a strange expression. He didn't know what to do with the tears…they were like a foreign language he had forgotten how to speak…he could do nothing but stare at her, and hold onto her hand for dear life.

She wasn't smiling…and yet, in some invisible way, never in his life had he seen her look happier.

"Are y'alright, Mr. T? Did they get the bugger out?"

He couldn't help it. He laughed. Just once, short, ironic, and virtually mirthless…but it was a _laugh. _A plain, human, honest to goodness, laugh.

He nodded. "Yes."

Nellie's eyes fell closed for a moment. "That's wonderful, dearie."

They were silent a moment. He wanted to pull her into him, wanted to feel the solidity of her body in his arms…he resisted the urge. He forced himself to be content, for the moment, with holding her hand.

"Mr. T," she said presently, looking up at him through soft eyes, suddenly shining with a different light. He leaned forward, listening eagerly.

"I'm here."

"Mr. T…I 'ave a question."

He gripped her hand tighter, leaning even closer, so close he could almost feel the warmth of her breath on his skin.

"What?" he half-whispered.

She gazed up at him, sweetly, sadly…and he realized that the lights in her eyes were tears.

"Did you really ask me to marry you?"

He nearly laughed again…but instead, the sentiment materialized as a sigh of frustration. He hung his head down, letting it rest for a moment on the back of her hand. He looked back up, shaking his head slightly.

"How many times do I have to _tell _you, you foolish…"

He trailed off, his voice, for just a moment, regaining its ancient tone of sternness and impatience. To his dismay, the tears only welled further in her eyes…his half-smile vanished.

"I'm sorry, love," she shut her eyes, and the tears trickled down. They seared inside him like fire. "I'm sorry….for everythin', for always jabbering the livin' daylights out o' you, for always pesterin' you, for…for bein' such a silly nit all the time…for…for losin' 'er…for lettin' 'er drink it…for lettin' them take 'er away from me, away from you, I…I…I'm so sorry, Mr. T…"

The words streamed into his eyes like an unstoppable current…he was transfixed for a moment in horror, before finally regaining mobility and moving forward to lay his hand over her mouth as she degenerated into silent sobs.

"Mrs. Lovett," he heard himself growl, his teeth clenched and a strange, foreign kind of anger rising in his chest. "_Stop it," _he ordered. "Stop it this _instant."_

Her eyes suddenly shot open, sparkling with tears, as she jerked bolt upright in the bed, just narrowly avoiding clocking him in the face with her skull and breaking his nose afresh. Before he could so much as open his mouth, she had thrown her arms around his neck and was drowning him with kisses. He was helpless against the barrage…he could do nothing but hover, his arms held gently around her waist, blinking in stunned silence as she bombarded him. Her lips pressed on his cheeks, his forehead, his lips, his eyes, over and over again…he could hear nothing but the repeated gentle puckering of her soft mouth, mingled with faint sniffling. Finally, when he was just at the verge of actually beginning to have trouble breathing, she ceased firing, hugging him tighter and burying her face beneath his jaw. He sucked in a breath of air, still dazed and flushed from the volley of affection. Blinking, he hugged her closer to him, at last savoring the real, solid presence of her body…her bones, her muscles, her whole self, pressed against his heart…he buried his nose in her hair, inhaling the clean, mild scent. After a long moment, he realized she was speaking, crying something softly over and over under her breath.

"I love you. I love you, I love you, I _love you…_oh, Mr. Todd, you don't know…you could _never _know, 'ow long I've waited to tell you…'ow _badly _I've wanted you…oh, Sweeney…my love, my love…won' you say it? Won' you say it to me…just once?"

Sweeney froze. He opened his eyes. His arms locked in place around her, abruptly as stiff and rigid as stone. She nuzzled softly into the crook of his neck, dabbing his skin with her tears.

_The words._

_The __**words.**_

_His reason for holding onto his sanity. His reason to keep on living. _

_To say the __**words. **__The words he couldn't possibly say. The words that would finally destroy Benjamin Barker forever. _

_I love you._

He opened his eyes.

He took a breath, preparing himself to finally say them…to just _say them, _in one go, to finally have the truth out, once and for all…

Something moved in the corner of his peripheral vision, and he stopped He jerked his face towards it.

For one split-instant, his blood ran cold, and his heart filled with dread.

_It was Barker._

Benjamin Barker. Dressed, not in thin, pale hospital clothing, but a finely tailored brown waistcoat and an amber vest, a clean, starched white collar folded crisply beneath his jaw. His hair…rich, dark brown, trimmed to meticulous exactitude, curling boyishly at the edges of his face. His skin…bright, glowing, kissed with sunlight. His eyes…not black, but brown…the rich, shining brown of an unspoiled innocence.

Benjamin Barker. Sitting in the chair, leaning forward, staring straight at Sweeney…with his arms around Nellie.

For a frozen moment of time, Todd and Barker stared at each other, their faces mirror images of speechless shock.

_Mirror images. _

He was looking into a mirror hanging on the opposite wall of the room. He was staring at his own reflection…and yet, it wasn't his at all.

_Barker._

For one fleeting instant, Sweeney was overcome my the most absurd surge of seething, raging jealousy he had ever felt…he was halfway towards storming over and smashing the mirror to pieces in order wrench Nellie away from Barker's arms when he reminded himself, through clenched teeth, that it wasn't really Nellie Benjamin was holding, that it was only her reflection…still, all the same, he tightened his arms protectively around her, locking her into his embrace so securely it was a wonder she could breathe.

"Sweeney," she was whispering into his neck, her voice still broken with tears. "Sweeney…please…can't you say it, love? Can't you say it…only once?"

The two barbers simply stared at each other.

In all that had happened since he'd left Johanna asleep on the bed in the House of Records, Sweeney had completely forgotten about him….now, as he stared at his inner ghost reflected in the mirror, Benjamin's haunting words drifted back to him, striking like a hammer in his mind. He remembered his own voice, stripped of its strength, stripped of everything except a blank, pleading supplication…

"_I know that you're going to try and kill us, Benjamin. I know there's nothing I can do to stop you from trying. I just---want to ask you if you'll wait, until I've---until I've gotten them back."_

_Silence._

"_Please, Benjamin," he whispered. "Wait until I have them back."_

_Silence. For a long moment, nothing…but silence. Then---_

"_For Johanna, Todd," Barker answered quietly. "For her, and no one else. I'll wait…I'll wait until my daughter is safe with the boy again."_

_Safe with the boy again._

Johanna was safe. She had been safe since the moment he had seen the Beadle collapse unconsciously to the ground outside of the burned ruins of the pie shop.

But here he was….alive.

Barker had done nothing.

The mouth in the mirror moved. The brown eyes narrowed, watching Sweeney over Nellie's shoulder. Barker's voice sounded, as warm and alive as if he were a body of flesh and blood sitting right there beside him…and yet, when he spoke, Nellie didn't so much as flinch in his arms. She showed no sign that she had heard him at all, and Sweeney knew…fleetingly, carelessly…that Benjamin's voice was only in his mind.

"I want to see her, Todd."

Sweeney blinked. "Benjamin…you…why didn't you…?"

"I want to see her."

Sweeney stared, his face softening as understanding slowly washed over him.

"Johanna."

Barker suddenly scowled, his eyes hardening even as tears began to shine in them…he glared, as if struggling violently not to break into hysterical sobs.

"I…am not…going…to kill you, Sweeney Todd."

Silence.

Nellie gasped and cried.

"Love," she moaned, holding him tighter. "Love…why won't you say somethin'?"

Sweeney stroked her hair soothingly. To his faint anger, Barker's reflection did the same…but the brown eyes never once strayed from him.

Sweeney spoke softly, calmly, and…strangely enough…without any true tone of surprise. Perhaps he had simply come to the point where nothing would surprise him anymore.

Barker suddenly, abruptly, looked down.

"I'm not going to…I _can't…_because…because…"

Sweeney waited, his mouth a still, firm line. He held Nellie close to him, never once loosening his embrace.

Barker's eyes were bright, his voice barely audible, as he whispered…

"…because…you really do love her…don't you, Todd?"

Sweeney's hand froze on the back of Nellie's head. His face changed not the slightest bit…but his heart was pounding and his mind was racing.

Slowly, calmly…as if it were the simplest question in the world, asked casually of one old friend to another…he answered.

"I do."

Barker nodded, and all of a sudden he was smiling…sadly.

"And you love the boy."

Sweeney didn't move.

"Yes."

"And…and…you love…our daughter."

His heart clenched, his throat knotted, and his eyes stung…but he refused to so much as blink.

"Yes," he answered quietly.

Benjamin nodded again. Tears were falling visibly down his cheeks…he smiled wider, and laughed suddenly, briefly.

"You…you do, don't you? You…you love her, as much as I do…as…as much as I ever did."

Sweeney stared. He didn't know it…but the sharpness had suddenly vanished from his cold, unblinking gaze.

"And…they love you, in return. Eleanor, and her son."

Sweeney closed his eyes---just for an instant. His heart ached in his chest. He held Nellie closer, and he felt her lips against his neck.

"Yes," he answered…and realized that it was the truth.

Barker looked away.

"I can't kill you, Todd. I think…I think…somewhere deep inside, I…I knew it all along. I could no more kill you than I could kill any of them. They…they need you."

The pain was rising up in Sweeney's throat, burning behind his eyes. He knew now what it was. He wanted to cry. The memories of what it was like to feel…to _want _to feel…were slowly ebbing back to him after sixteen years of cold, stone-heartedness.

Benjamin suddenly looked back up at him.

"It's…it's really true, then. Deep down…no matter what…you and I will always be the same man…Sweeney Todd."

Sweeney shut his eyes against the pain. He buried his face in Nellie's hair for a moment, drawing strength from the warmth of her body.

"I…I only have one thing to…to ask of you, Todd, before…before you say it. Could I…c-could I please…just for a moment…could…"

Sweeney opened his eyes…and Benjamin's face was blurred with tears, as he whispered, in the silence of his mind…

"…could I see my daughter?"

Sweeney closed his eyes. The tears fell from his eyes, and…strangely enough…strange, like everything that had happened that day…they didn't bother him.

He opened his eyes, and gently, tenderly, pulled back from Nellie's embrace far enough to look her in the eye. She gazed at him sadly, lovingly, yet with such a deep, burning happiness that it was wrought like a visible pain across her face. He softly…slowly…leaned toward her, and pressed a kiss onto her forehead.

"Nellie," he said soothingly, as he leaned his face into the crown of her head.

She sniffled. He closed his eyes and drank in her quiet scent.

"Wait…just one moment longer."

He felt her eyes squeeze shut. He lifted his hand to cup the side of her face, and touched another gentle kiss into her hairline.

"Just one moment longer…."

…_my love._

_I promise._

A/N; I swear, I tried my _absolute best _not to end this chapter in a cliffhanger…hopefully, this one's not quite as steep as the others. At least everyone's alive, right?? Anyway, I'd just like to take this moment to say…holy sweet son of a monkey grinder. FOUR HUNDRED, FIFTY-SIX REVIEWS ( faints from euphoria ). You people are the cheese to my cake. My absolute, _sincerest _thanks to every reviewer, but most especially to the ones who have been with this labyrinthine mess since chapter one. You know who you are, and you know that you straight up ROCK! Thank you, everyone! ^_0


	37. Chapter 37

_A/N; Woot!! Chapter 37, y'all! Man, oh man…I did this pretty much in one sitting, and it __wore _me _out. _Hope you like it!

Disclaimer; I do not own Sweeney Todd. Neither do you. And I'm too tired and hungry to take the time to come up with a fun way of saying that.

Chapter 37

_Angels Prevail_

_The little boy…Toby, Anthony had said his name was…all of a sudden he was shouting about something. His shrill voice from above and behind them pierced Johanna's ears, causing her to jerk her head up from the crumpled papers in her hands. Hastily, without thinking, she stuffed the contract and Judge Turpin's will into the top of her dress, forcing them down uncomfortably into the space between her corset and her sternum until they were hidden from view. She looked up, pursing her lips and narrowing her eyes curiously in the direction that the boy was yelling._

"_MUM!" _

_Her gaze focused in on the strange, shadowy shape hurrying towards them, two figures silhouetted as one in the light of the lampposts…._

…_and her heart stopped._

_She barely noticed Mrs. Lovett throwing herself on the ground, she and the boy locking together in a tearful embrace. She heard Anthony's voice ring hollowly in her ears, only as one hears an echo…numbly, she felt the carriage rock slightly as he leapt down from it. _

"_Sweeney__! Oh, Mr. Todd…__my friend__…thanks heavens you're alright!!"_

_Mr. Todd._

_Johanna felt as if all of the feeling had been sapped from her body, her nerves severed and left dangling in a suspension of unreality. She stared into the pale, terrible face…the black eyes, the white streak through his hair…everything exactly as she had seen it, exactly as it had been stamped nightmarishly in her mind since the fateful night…__**everything,**__ right down to the blood smattered over his skin._

_And he was looking back at her._

_She sat in the seat of the hansom, her wide, terrified eyes locked unbreakably with his. Her face had blanched as pale as death…she trembled silently, her mouth open, paralyzed in complete and utter horror. Her fingers gripped the cushion of the seat tighter and tighter, her gaze never once blinking from his face._

_This was it. She had finally come face to face with her demon…she was gripped by a vice of dread greater than any she had ever known._

…_and yet…_

…_hidden, deep beneath her fear, somewhere at the innermost core of her being, fluttering, like a second heartbeat…she felt something else. Something that wasn't fearful at all….a small, flickering grasp of memory._

_**In her dreams…she thought she heard a voice. **_

_**The face appeared over her. He smiled, his dark eyes shining in the faint moonlight that streamed through the window. She looked up at him, and she was calm.**_

_His dark eyes…shining in the moonlight…_

_She was looking into them, now. She was sure of it. She had never been surer of anything in her life._

_As she stared at him, his mouth opened, and she heard him whisper something softly into the empty air between them._

"_Jo…Johanna…"_

"_**Where's my Johanna?"**_

_**Such a gentle voice…deep, and soft, and dark…**_

_All at once, like a flash of sunlight into a dreary grey world, she realized the truth….and it was too great for her heart to bear, too unreal for her mind to comprehend._

"_**Oh, where's daddy's little girl?"**_

_Her eyes rolled in the back of her head, and she fell limply back against the seat in a cold faint._

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Sweeney was certain he was having more difficulty swallowing than he ought to. His throat was bone dry, his mouth permeated with a strange taste like stale water. He ran his tongue nervously over his teeth. He fidgeted with the too-long cuffs of his hospital night shirt. He opened a button, then refastened it, then undid it again. He glanced up, his eyes darting to the bed, anxious for something to distract him.

Nellie and Toby sat together beneath the covers, leaning against each other. The boy's eyelids were beginning to droop sleepily, and he gazed listlessly down at the white comforter, his shoulders slack and his head hanging low…but Nellie was wide awake. She stroked her fingers absently through Toby's hair, glancing up at him in short intervals. A tense silence filled the room like a tangible presence, a rope coiling itself in knots. Their eyes met for perhaps the tenth time…and for the tenth time, she held his gaze quivering, for one suspended instant before quickly looking away again, as if there were something she desperately wanted to say, but refused to let herself. She had absently twisted her hair in her hands, wrapping it around to hang over one shoulder and leaving her long, bare neck exposed. Sweeney found himself following the contours of it with his eyes, forgetting, for just one blissful moment, what was going on in the room beside them.

A small sound---footsteps, moving toward the other side of the closed door---instantly reminded him. He looked back down at his hands, alternately clenching and opening them. His fingers were restless. He wished, almost childishly, that he had something small to hold onto, but knew that he wouldn't really know what to do with it if he had. He was leaning against the lintel of the door into the adjoined room…his strength had yet to even halfway return to him, but he was now at least able to stand without drowning in a swell of dizziness.

The footsteps drew nearer. The handle of the door clicked, then turned slowly. He found himself staring at it, his face blank, his throat constricted and breathless.

Sweeney Todd had never been more nervous about anything in his life.

Pleadingly, frantically, almost, he threw his gaze back to Nellie a final time. Her eyes were wide and helpless, her mouth twisted in a wordless speech that plainly told him she wished she could do something…but knew that she couldn't.

He was practically shaking as the door opened, slowly, and Anthony Hope stepped into the room, shutting it again behind him.

For a brief moment, the sailor held his hand on the knob, looking down wearily at the floor. He was bruised, and still very shaken-looking, and the cut on his temple now sported a small, neat row of stitches. Sweeney realized he was staring at the boy's face, breath baited, waiting. His racing heart leapt into his mouth when Anthony turned to look at him.

Sweeney opened his mouth and discovered that words were beyond him. His eyes---so silent, so anxious, they were almost frightened-looking---burned into the boy's, begging him for…for what, he wasn't sure.

Anthony gave a long, exhausted exhale. Sweeney swallowed again, his throat somehow even drier than before.

"She'll see you, Mr. Todd."

The words, far from lifting the suffocating burden around his heart, as he'd thought they would, dropped inside him like weights and filled him with an abrupt, incomprehensible dread. His nerves twisted into a knot double the tightness they had been a moment ago.

Jaw clenching, forcing himself to be steady…he nodded. It took two tries before he could find his voice, and when he did it was little more than a pale, hollow, whisper.

"Thank…you…Anthony."

Anthony---_bless him…he'll be as naïve as a child until the day he dies---_smiled weakly.

"No…no, thank _you, _my friend. I realize…" he lifted his hand and put it on Sweeney's shoulder, squeezing encouragingly, "…how…how _difficult _this must be for you."

Sweeney looked down, for some reason unable to hold the young man's gaze. He said nothing.

"I've explained to her everything," Anthony whispered gently, taking Sweeney's other shoulder as well, bracing him heartily, as if in feeble effort to imbue him with confidence. "Everything exactly as you told it me. She _wants _to see you, my friend."

Sweeney squeezed his eyes shut. _God---_he knew Anthony only meant well, but every word that he uttered only made the horrible feeling in the bottom of his stomach grow worse and worse. He couldn't help but feel a dreaded certainty that the emphasis in his voice---_she __**wants **__to see you---_was false, forced only for his benefit.

_God in heaven.…he had never even known nerves like this existed. How was it that he'd been able to buck up the courage to propose to Nellie---to __**propose **__to her__**, **__for God's sake!…after swearing to himself long ago that he'd never so much as __**think **__about any woman who wasn't Lucy---but the mere thought of confronting his daughter---his __**daughter, **__his own flesh and blood---turned him to a trembling coward?_

The answer, of course, which came to him instantly, was simple.

_You already knew---deep down, you knew all along---how Nellie felt about you. It was her love in the first place that gave you the strength to do it._

_But with Johanna…_

He moved himself from the lintel, looking up and staring into the wood of the closed door, the grain blurring into an incongruous haze before his glazed eyes. He had, quite suddenly, stopped trembling, and was replaced with a far worse sensation…he was stiff from head to toe, as frozen and rigid as the door he was afraid to open.

_With Johanna….there's no telling what will happen._

Anthony had moved quietly across the room to stand at the foot of Nellie's bed. Sweeney looked back at the three of them, stalling without realizing it. His gazed fixed automatically on Nellie, his face drawn in a pale expression of dread.

_Help me, _his eyes begged.

Nellie looked back at him, her mouth set into a firm line…soft, and resolute at the same time. Slowly, she inclined her head toward him in a somber, reassuring nod.

_Go, love, _she urged gently in reply.

_Go._

Sweeney gulped, so thickly it was probably audible. He turned back to the door. His heart pounded. His palms were moist. His bare feet felt suddenly numb and heavy, like blocks of clay stuck to the floorboards. He felt his arm moving, felt the cool press of the doorknob into his hand…heard the gentle creak as he pushed it open, a crack just wide enough for him to slip through, and then…._click. _It shut fast behind him.

And just like that…he was alone in the room with his daughter.

His face was as blank as a brick wall…but his heart felt as if it was going to jump out of his chest any second. The dull ache of the wound in his side was pale in comparison to the electric hollowness in his stomach, the fluttering of simultaneous excitement and terror too monumental for expression.

His eyes fell instantly upon her. He heard a sound…a sharp, sudden noise from deep in his throat, a gasp and a guttural cry of emotion melded together…and for once, he had not the slightest idea if it was he, or Benjamin Barker who had produced it. Perhaps, for the first time, the two of them had actually done something in perfect unison.

Johanna's head jerked sharply toward the sound, and Sweeney was immediately consumed in the pools of her enormous grey eyes. A sensation, at once both horrible and miraculous, burst inside him, and he again felt the overwhelming urge to sob aloud. He stood there, rooted to the spot at the door, staring across the small room---a mirror image of the one next door---into a face that he had again---_oh, so many times_---convinced himself he would never see again in his lifetime.

_Those eyes were the eyes of Lucy Barker. Down to the last minutiae, they were hers. The color of the irises, like the sky on an overcast morning…the gentle, sweeping curl of the lashes, light, flecked with golden-brown at the ends…the way they stared at him, as if they were a tangible force, a hand, reaching out to brush against__his face. Lucy was watching him from somewhere deep behind those eyes, peering out at him through windows from the past._

Johanna was sitting upright on the edge of the bed. She was thin to the point of being waif-like…her posture was flawless---_a lifelong reminder of her stiff upbringing, no doubt_---her hands folded delicately in her lap. She was wearing the same dress as she had when he'd seen her asleep in Turpin's mansion, but the left sleeve had been cut off at the elbow to allow treatment of the injuries on her forearm. Her arm was wrapped in gauze down to her wrist, and white bandages covered the cuts on her face, as well. A thin hospital blanket hung limply over her shoulders, and dark shadows hung beneath her eyes, marring her perfect complexion and adding years to her appearance. For a brief moment as he stared at her, her face shadowed in the golden light of the lamp beside the bed, she looked shockingly old…weary and harrowed, more like a woman of thirty than a mere girl of seventeen.

As he looked at her, a sad, forlorn thought occurred to him.

_She's a complete stranger._

_My own daughter…and I don't know a single thing about her at all._

Benjamin's voice was whispering in his head, gasping, empty in its utter loss for all but two words, over and over…

_My child…my child, my child, my child…_

"Johanna," he heard himself say aloud. He started. His heart began to race again. He'd said it before he could stop himself.

_Dear God…she's just like her…._

…_**too**__ like her…it pained his heart just to look at her._

Long ago, some vague time during the dim, grey dream that was the past year of his life, Nellie had asked him a question. A question he'd not been expecting when she came into his parlor that morning carrying a tray of breakfast.

"_Mr. T. Can I ask you a question?"_

_He'd only continued to stare out the window, ignoring her as always._

"_What?" he'd muttered coldly, disinterestedly._

"_What did your Lucy look like?"_

_He stopped._

_His eyes narrowed. His lips parted minutely to answer, only for the breath to stop dead in his throat as his mind drew a surprising blank._

_The realization hit him, all at once, with a terrible sensation of numbness, that he did not remember. Fifteen years of meditating on her night and day…of thinking of no one else, save his daughter, every waking moment of his existence…fifteen years spent building a veritable shrine to her in his mind…and he could not remember what her face looked like. At long last, the pedestal he had put her on had grown so high, she had vanished from sight._

"_Can't really remember, can you?" Mrs. Lovett, who even then had possessed the irksome ability to see straight through him, said gently._

"_She had yellow hair," was the only feeble reply he'd been able to muster._

And now…here she was. _Beautiful and pale, with yellow hair…like her._ Sitting silently in the lamplight right in front of him.

And yet…no…_no…_the more he looked at her, the longer he was wholly incapable of tearing his eyes away, the more he came to see it…she _wasn't _the spinning image of Lucy. Not exactly She had Lucy's eyes, and skin, and mouth, and flowing golden hair…but there was a strangely different look about her, a certain tilt to her face that didn't strike him the littlest bit like Lucy. He could see it…there were, unmistakably, parts of _him_ in her face, as well. The shape of her chin…the broad, graceful band of her forehead…the way she held her neck, the emotionless intensity with which she stared back at him…those belonged to him.

For an eternity, it seemed, they simply sat and gazed at each other, both of them blank, both of them silent.

_Johanna…my child…_

A sensation almost like the brewing of a sneeze suddenly began to build up inside of him…his chest rose, the breath moving involuntarily into his lungs. _It was Barker…he was going to speak, he was preparing to pour out every pain and lament of his soul to her…he was going to charge her and seize her and sob hysterically, Sweeney could __**feel **__it coming. _His eyes widened in a near-panic…_what would she say? What would she __**do? **__He would terrify her, he would terrify her all over again!_

_Barker, wait---! _

His lips parted, the torrent of words right on the tip of his tongue, when suddenly Johanna's voice sounded in his ears and instantly dissipated Barker's storm of hysterical emotion. The air rushed out of him, deflating him…he blinked, trying to regain himself. He narrowed his eyes at her, tears practically welling at the sound. It was the first time that he had heard her voice, knowing that it was his own daughter whom he was listening to.

"Hello."

Just one word. Small, quiet…barely a whisper. She was frightened…her back was rigid, her eyes fixed immovably on him. He could see her fighting her own apprehension with every ounce of strength she possessed. She looked at him as if he was a bodiless fear, a terror---like heights, or needles, or the sight of blood---a terror she was determined to overcome.

Her voice touched his heart like a flame licking over a block of ice. He shook himself, swallowed, and heard his own voice answering her calmly and quietly.

"Hello….Mrs. Hope."

With that single utterance…_Mrs. Hope…_the reality of the truth sunk in. Like a candle extinguishing into darkness, Barker seemed to crumble inside of him. It was a terrible sensation, as if his ribcage had just collapsed…he struggled to keep from lifting a hand and gripping his chest. He closed his eyes, for a single second.

_She can't know, Benjamin. She can't know the truth._

_It would destroy her._

Benjamin said only one thing in reply…then, fell entirely silent, lingering inside of Sweeney only as a ghost lingers amongst the living once it had finally come to terms with the fact that it can never truly be part of the world again.

_I know, Todd. I….I know._

Johanna cleared her throat quietly, snapping Sweeney back to reality. He blinked, his heart still pounding uncontrollably as he watched her from across the room. Every time he looked at her face, he was bombarded with memories of Lucy…he winced against them, struggling to maintain his repose.

_Remember. She's not your daughter. She's __**Benjamin Barker's **__daughter. _

Johanna looked away from him, the tension visible behind her eyes. She spoke as if she were in the same room as a wild animal ready to attack her at any moment…yet forcing herself to remain calm.

"Anthony…tells me…that the man you---that you----the m-man,in your barbershop that night, was….was Judge Turpin," she looked back at him, a combination of fear and uncertainty in her eyes that made Barker cry out inside of him with fresh grief. "Is… is that true, Mr. Todd?"

_Mr. Todd._

The cold, formal sound of his name, uttered stiffly and properly from her lips, jarred him. He felt a sudden surge of desire, an almost irrepressible urge to cry out, to shout at her…

_Call me father! Call me father! Please, just once, for the love of God…Johanna, my darling, my child…call me __**father!**_

Instead…he simply nodded, cold and numb with disbelief.

"Yes," he heard himself say quietly, bewildered at his own ability to even speak.

Johanna turned away again, staring out the window, pointedly avoiding his gaze.

"Then…then it's…it's true, Mr. Todd. What I saw that night. You…you…murdered him."

Sweeney squeezed his eyes shut. He had never experienced a pain quite like this. It paralyzed him…he didn't know what to do with it.

Benjamin still said nothing. He only stared silently through Sweeney's eyes, drinking her in, basking in the sight of her---the last earthly joy he would ever know.

Again…Sweeney felt himself nodding. His voice was hoarse and weak.

"Yes."

Then, all of a sudden, Johanna turned and looked at him…and her eyes were bright, flashing with anger and shining with unshed tears.

"I didn't love him," she cried out sharply, her voice rising out of nowhere into a pitch of feverish denial to an unspoken accusation. "Do you understand that, Mr. Todd? I _never _lovedJudge Turpin. Anthony told me, what he…what he did. How I came to be his. He….he was…." she threatened to burst into sobs; she closed her eyes briefly, sinking back down on the bed, biting back the tears. She drew in a shaking breath, and looked back out the window into the darkening night. "I want you to understand. I will never…_never…_feel sorrow for him. Any tears I shed…they will never…not a _single one _will be for him. _Never."_

Sweeney and Benjamin stared together, their heart pounding in their chest, watching her in a disbelieving mixture of fascination and uncertainty.

Johanna sniffed, her jaw clenching tautly. "Do you understand that?" she demanded, staring him straight in the eye.

Sweeney was immobilized. He couldn't even bring himself to nod…he simply gazed at her wistfully, his lips parted in mute helplessness.

Johanna looked down at her hands. She closed her eyes for a moment, dashing the back of her hand across her face, sniffling again. She cleared her throat lightly. When she looked back up, her eyes were beginning to redden….but all of the sudden anger had drained from her, replaced by a devastating look of the most desperate pleading Sweeney had ever seen.

And then, without any warning at all, she had suddenly bolted to her feet. Sweeney's chest clenched in an irrational vice of terror…he watched, wide-eyed and speechless, as the crossed the room to stand nearly arm's length away from him, clutching the ratty blanket around her shoulders as if it were the only thing keeping her wild emotions restrained. Sweeney actually backed away from her, his back thudding gently on the closed door. Her watery grey eyes held him pinned there, helpless…her lingering tears bolted him to the wall, her expression of miserable hope piercing like a stake in his heart.

"Anthony told me you knew my parents."

He had known this was coming. It made not the slightest difference. He flinched at the sharp tone of her voice…Benjamin literally cried out in pain….and---it was the strangest thing---in spite of his own heartbreak, lost and drowning as he was in Johanna's pleading eyes…Sweeney was suddenly overcome by the inexplicable urge to comfort Benjamin Barker. To _comfort _the ghost who had attempted twice---and damn near succeeded, once---to kill him in cold blood.

_Everything is going to change._

His heart gradually, gently, slowed to a calmer pace. He looked up, and met Johanna's gaze dead on. A strange, ethereal calm seemed to settle over him…the unbearable pain in his chest, the agony of her sadness, her years of loneliness and separation from anything even resembling love…seemed to melt into a hard callous.

_She's not your daughter._

_She's Benjamin's._

And for one moment…just one, single moment…he somehow allowed himself to truly believe it.

She watched him, desperate, waiting. He looked back at her, his face blank, but the sadness lingering like smoke somewhere far behind his eyes.

"I did," he said quietly.

Her lips quivered. She took another step towards him…his back pressed just slightly harder into the door. He was certain that if he touched her, his façade of indifference would crumble into dust. _He had to remain cold. _

_For Barker. _

"He told me why you did it," Johanna cried, suddenly wild and fearless. "He told me that you didn't know it was me…that you wouldn't have killed me, even if Mrs. Lovett hadn't screamed…I didn't believe him, Mr. Todd, I _still _don't know if I believe him…but it doesn't matter anymore! I'll forget it, I'll forget everything, if…if…"

She looked as if she were about to break down…unshed tears hung bright and gleaming in her eyes. She was inches away from him now, leaning towards him…he pressed himself into the door as closely as he could, staring down at her with an unreadable expression, torn between the need to keep his distance from her and the overwhelming desire to seize her and never let go.

_Sixteen years…sixteen years, since he'd felt his daughter in his arms…and now, when she once again within his grasp…he couldn't do it._

He might have almost smiled with the ludicrous irony of it all…if his heart weren't breaking.

_For you, Benjamin Barker. So you can finally die in peace._

Johanna swallowed, her whole body trembling faintly now.

He forced his voice to remain calm and low. "If what?" he asked gently.

"If…if you'll tell me about them," she whispered.

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0--0-0-0-0-0-0-

Johanna stared at the man in front of her, her pleading gaze never blinking, never once wavering from his face. Her heart was in her mouth, her head light and spinning from the rapid, silent breath rushing in and out in jolted intervals. Her eyes burned into him, waiting, waiting…_hoping…_

_I know it's the truth….I know it is…._

…_please…please, God…._

…_let it be the truth…._

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

Inside, Benjamin was silent with awe. Inside, Sweeney was wrought with a resigned, deliberate grief. Outside, neither of them so much as flinched.

With the cold demeanor of a living statue, he edged around her, taking great care not to look at her, not to so much as graze her with his shoulder. He walked past her and went to stand in front of the window, his arms hanging limply at his sides, staring with dead and unfeeling eyes out at the dark street below. All of London seemed spread out at his feet in every direction.

_Strange. From up here, it almost looks….peaceful._

He stared emotionlessly at his reflection in the black window…and it was not his face, but the awe-stricken face of Benjamin Barker. When he spoke, his voice was calm and lifeless.

"I did know them."

A small, stifled cry…a cry whose nature he could not quite determine…sounded from the other side of the room. Johanna lifted her hand over her mouth, turning to stare at the back of his head. He went on, knowing that if he stopped to let himself think, to let himself feel, he would never be able to endure it.

"Your father's name was Benjamin Barker."

Silence, save for the gentle creaking of the floorboards as Johanna ever so slowly took one, then two steps toward him. He didn't look back at her. He stared at Barker's face in the mirror.

"He was a good man. He was an honest man. Never let anyone tell you differently. Your mother's name was…"

He felt himself faltering, felt the pain welling up and lumping in his chest…he cleared his throat shortly, and forced himself to continue on, speaking as blankly and monotonously as if he were reading words out of a book.

"Your mother's name was Lucy. She was…the most beautiful…thing…your father had ever seen. They had a perfect life together. They were young. They were virtuous. They were…"

_Creak. _Another gentle step forward. He could feel her presence drawing closer and closer…without realizing it, he moved his hand to grip tightly to the back of the chair resting by the window.

"…naïve."

_Creak._

"I knew them…your…parents. They were very dear friends of mine. I…I remember when you were born. Mrs. Hope. If you believe nothing else I say to you…believe this. Your mother and father, _loved you. _They loved you more than you will ever know."

_Creak. _Sweeney was numb. He spoke without thinking, without hearing his own voice. One corner of his mouth turned upward suddenly in a sad half-smile.

"I wish you could have seen them," he said softly. "The silliest, most love-sick parents you could ever imagine…how they doted on you, how they adored your every move…they would sit with you in bed, for hours, watching as you slept, holding your little hands…your feet…you were more precious to them than anything, anything in the world…" before he realized it, Sweeney had chuckled quietly to himself, the images painted in his mind as clear as if they were happening before his eyes that very moment. "Your father…Benjamin…he hadn't the faintest idea how to care for you, at first…"

_Creak…_

"…He was petrified. He'd sit with you in a chair, rigid as a statue, terrified of dropping you…if you so much as coughed, he'd fly into a panic…foolish, simple---it was your mother, who looked after you both…she…and you…you were…"

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

_Creak…_

Johanna couldn't breathe. The tears were welling so thickly in her eyes, she could scarcely see…everything was a slow, surreal blur of dim color and golden light. She stared at his back, his lean, weary frame…the wild mane of dark hair…_those eyes…his voice, so quiet, so gentle…_

_Looking down at her….soothing her as she cried…calming her back to sleep…_

_His footsteps in the room….she was sure of it….she __**had **__to be sure of it…_

_Creak._

She inched closer and closer to him. Her hand slowly stretched forward, reaching to him….

_Forget my face, he had said._

_No. She had never forgotten him. Not truly. Somewhere, deep, buried in the bottom of her heart, his memory had endured. Every day, every hour, every moment of her life…every moment for seventeen long, lonely years….__**somewhere**__ inside….she had known he was out there._

_Waiting for her._

_Forget his face?_

_Never._

Her quivering lips parted to form a single word…but she couldn't find the strength to say it aloud. He was still talking, his gentle voice dull and lifeless…but it didn't matter.

_She knew it. __**She knew it."**_

"…the two of you were his whole life, Johanna," he said quietly.

All of a sudden, the space between them had disappeared. She was standing right behind him. The tears blurred from her sight everything but the shape of him in front of her.

She reached out to him.

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

Sweeney froze, his mouth open in mid-sentence.

His entire body went rigid as he felt the warmth of a small, delicate hand laying gently on his back.

The breath caught in his chest. His jaw hovered silently, his eyes staring forward, unable to blink, unable to move.

Her voice whispered behind him, so close…so close he could feel her. She was trembling, choking back tears.

"You…you must have known my f-father…v-very well…Mr. Todd. You must have been…terribly close."

Sweeney couldn't speak. He couldn't remember what he had been about to say before she had touched him. His mind was a complete blank…he knew nothing but the warmth of her hand, pressed between his shoulder blades. It radiated through him like a pulse, paralyzing him.

Johanna swallowed, sniffling, struggling to hold back her tears.

"I…I wonder, Mr. Todd…if…if deep down…I don't remember you?"

For once, Benjamin's expression in the window was an exact mirror of his own. Then, he looked away from the window, as he felt Johanna's frail, shaking hands taking him by the shoulders and slowly turning him around to face her. He moved as if through a dream.

_How could this be real? How could…how…_

She softly, almost tenderly eased him down to sit in the straight-backed chair beside the window. Her face was torn with an expression he couldn't name. Enormous shimmering wells of tears shone in the corners of her eyes…her skin was flushed, her lips quivering. Her golden hair was mussed, framed her face in tousled waves. She slowly, carefully, leaned forward. The blanket slipped from her shoulders and fell unnoticed to the floor.

He watched, lost in her eyes, drifting…_it must be a dream…_watched, as she lifted both hands to his face, cupping his cheeks in her palms. She bent over, gazing straight into his eyes. He couldn't breathe.

"I wonder…" she whispered, trembling from head to foot. "I wonder…if I don't remember you, after all…"

The pad of her thumb traced gently beneath his eye.

"I have…just one more question for you…Mr. Todd."

His lips parted. He moved, numbly…he lifted his hand and held it over hers.

_If only angels could prevail…._

And then…ever so faintly…ever so gently…almost imperceptible, like the drifting of a cloud across the sky…she smiled.

_It wasn't a dream._

"How could you lie…to your own daughter?"

Sweeney Todd and Benjamin Barker acted as one…completely in unison. Completely, wholly, and uncomplicatedly…at peace with each other.

A sob…agony, longing, joy, fused into one…a sob of exquisite release wrenched from his throat. Tears flooded immediately in his eyes and streamed down his face. Johanna's tears, after an eternity of longing, finally fell, matched perfectly with his.

"Father!" she cried hysterically, her voice striking his heart like a bell. "Father, father!"

She threw herself onto him. It was a movement of perfect syncopation. She fell onto his lap, her skirts spreading and eclipsing his knees…she threw her arms around his neck just as he pulled her into his, wrapping them around her back and pressing her thin, waif-like form into his so hard their heartbeats seemed to meld together. They were both crying, but all of the sounds…gasping, hiccupping, wordless muttering, joyful sobbing…were coming from Johanna. Sweeney squeezed his eyes shut---the tears finding passage through them regardless---and buried his face in her hair. Her small face pressed into the side of his as she cried unceasingly, the tears flowing, if possible, at an even faster and more copious rate than his.

Time stood still.

For an eternal, unmarked moment…they simply held each other, their embrace never loosening, their arms never slackening. If anything they held each other tighter with each unreal second.

Sweeney realized that his silent sobs were so forceful, they were shaking them both as one. They trembled together in perfect unison. Benjamin Barker did not have the means to speak. It was his thoughts…an exact partner of Sweeney's own…that were echoing over and over through his mind.

_Johanna…Johanna…Johanna….my girl…my girl…_

…_my girl…_

And apart from that…all thought was impossible.

Sweeney crushed her into him. He couldn't convince himself of the solidity of her body, the reality of her presence. _It couldn't be real…it couldn't be….it couldn't…_but it was. He never woke up. He never jerked, seizing, opening his eyes to find himself once more alone in his barbershop, alone in a dusty room beneath a cracked ceiling, alone in a cell…always alone. _No. No matter how fiercely he held her, she didn't disappear. She didn't evaporate in his hands like so many thousands of cruel dreams before her. Not this time._

_This time, she was real._

Between her unending cries and gasps for air, she was saying it…over and over, the sweetest sound he had ever heard.

"Father…father, father, father…father…"

He wanted to answer her, but could still find no strength to speak. He squeezed his eyes shut, lifting his hand to cradle the back of her head, forcing it down beneath his chin, pressing his mouth into the top of her head and holding it there, unmoving. She burrowed into his chest, allowed her arms to slip from his neck so her fingers could instead fist in the fabric of his shirt. He folded his arms around her and held her there, pressed against his heart.

And together…there, on the chair, beside the dark window…they stayed.

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The lamp had gone out. The room was submerged in total darkness, save for the pale, lonely beam of faintest moonlight drifting through the window. It was barely any light at all…but it fell across his pale face, lit the streak through his hair like a jolt of lightning, played in the depths of his endless, half-lidded black eyes as he gazed down at her.

His fingers were stroking gently through her hair. She lowered her chin again, closing her still-bleary eyes---_she had never cried so hard in her life, not once…not once, through her years and untold years of crying…no, before this night, she had not known what it meant to cry. _She nestled her head back against his chest, listening to the slow, rhythmic thumping of his heart. She hugged her arms tighter around his torso, latching on as if she never meant to let go. His warm, strong arms in turn pulled her closer against him.

"Why," she heard herself whisper softly, sleepily. "Why, father…"

When he spoke, she felt his voice rumbling, deep in his chest. She pressed closer against the sensation, wanting to vanish inside of it, wanting to fuse and become one with the beating of his heart, the rising and falling of his breath.

"I never wanted you to know," he said softly, his deep voice catching with a heartbreaking emotion she couldn't quite define.

"How," she cried softly, squeezing her eyes shut tighter. "How could you ever want to keep us apart?"

"Johanna," he said, and the way he said her name, only once, contained in it more fatherly love than she had ever heard from an hundred-thousand utterances by Judge Turpin. "You don't know what I am."

"The Judge deserved to die," she whispered, willing the tears not to form again. "And the Beadle. They deserved what they got…you're not a murderer, father, you're an angel…an angel…"

His chest seized faintly, as if he were struggling to contain something. She couldn't see his face, but she somehow sensed that he was staring off through the open window, his eyes bright with pain.

"Johanna. I've killed others."

The statement…so blank, so bald-faced…should have shocked her. Should have caused her to gasp, draw away from him, her heart pounding with fear.

Should have.

Her only response was to hold him tighter.

"I don't care," she blurted out, not having to think for an instant.

"Johanna. I am a murderer. I've killed innocent men."

There was a sudden desperation to his voice, a pouring-out of his very soul. Where, less than twenty-four hours before, the mere memory of his face was enough to set her into a terrified fit of horror…now, the admission that he had killed---many times---didn't so much as cause her eyelids to flutter.

"I don't care," she said again.

His chest was jerking again, grasp futilely for breath.

"Johanna," he whispered, and she heard the tears in his voice. "How…how can you…?"

Without pausing, she sat up straight, looking him square in the eye. He blinked in surprise, his hand pausing at it ran almost therapeutically through her hair. He looked back at her in complete bewilderment.

"Father," she said firmly, struggling to keep herself from trembling. "I have looked into the eyes of a monster."

He blinked again. Tenderly, caressingly, she lifted her hand and stroked it along the side of his face.

"I have looked…every day of my entire life…into the eyes of a man truly, hopelessly, consumed by evil. I have _seen _what a monster is."

She was unable to keep her voice from shaking, now. But she swallowed, and forbade the tears from falling. She leaned forward, laying her head over his shoulder, and letting her eyes fall closed.

"And you are not a monster."

Her words seemed to hang, like a wisp of fog, lingering in the darkness around them. For a moment, all was silent.

She nestled deeper into the crook of his neck.

"You're sorry for what you've done. I can see it…in your eyes."

He said nothing…but she felt the gentle warmth of his face, resting against the crown of her head.

Faintly, quietly…just as she felt the soft edges of sleep---real, peaceful, dreamless sleep---settling around her for the first time in what felt like half a lifetime…Johanna smiled.

"I knew…" she whispered, her voice fading further and further with each word, "I think…somehow…all along, I knew…you were out there."

The last thing she remembered before slipping completely into empty, blissful darkness, was the sudden sway of the world, moving, as if floating, falling away beneath her…she felt the strong cradle of his arms, carrying her across the floor…felt the soft press of the mattress and the pillow as he lay her down on the bed, gently pulling the covers up to her chin. She felt the almost intangible brush of lips against her forehead….and she thought---she had drifted off to sleep before she could be completely sure, but she thought---she heard him whisper a single word, muffled into her skin.

"_Salvation."_

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It was dark. Too dark to see the small, yellowed face of the clock on the little table beside the bed.

Nellie sat, her shoulders slightly hunched, her eyes watching wearily into the darkness, in exactly the same position she had been in hours ago, when Mr. Todd had shut the door to the adjoining room behind them.

Her mind was an exhausted blank. Through the dim, pale wash of moonlight streaming through the window, she could just make out the calm, expressionless lines of Toby's face. He had fallen asleep ages ago, snuggled serenely beneath the covers, his head resting in her lap. Despite her consuming weariness, Nellie couldn't help but smile down at him, her fingers stroking gently through his scruffy hair.

Anthony had also long since fallen asleep. He was propped up in the straight-backed chair at the window, his arms folded and his head slung low over his breast. He breathed in and out in a shallow, audible rhythm, his shoulders rising and falling with each gentle rush.

Nellie blinked, then yawned enormously. She had been absolutely determined to stay awake until Sweeney returned, but as the minutes wore into hours, and the hours wore long past midnight, she had begun to lose the battle against her tired body. She found her head bobbing, her mind drifting sleepily off into nothingness…for the hundredth time, she jerked herself awake again, struggling to steel her resolve.

A small sound opened her eyes.

_Click._

She turned to peer curiously in the direction of the noise, the moonlight barely strong enough to leave an illuminated square on the floorboards…but she could see the movement in the darkness, the gentle opening and closing of the door, and the pale, shadowy figure slipping silently across the threshold and shutting it behind him with a tiny click of the locks.

Nellie smiled.

Hours ago, she had been dying to barrage him with questions…to learn every detail that had traversed between he and Johanna…to offer him every last ounce of her love and comfort, should he find need of it. She wanted to speak to him, to quietly whisper his name across the dark room…but all of a sudden, she couldn't muster the will the make even the smallest sound. Perhaps it was her dogged sleepiness, or the perfect tranquility of the room, or the calm, serene way he seemed to move noiselessly on his feet…but whatever the reason, she couldn't bring herself to tarnish the moment with words.

She only smiled.

_Hello, love._

She watched as he crept nearer and nearer to the bed, moving so stealthily that not even the ancient hospital floorboards uttered a single moan of protest. He cast a calm, passing glance to Anthony, still sleeping soundly on the chair.

Nellie still did not speak…but she felt her heart beginning to pound wildly, her fatigue vanishing like a puff of smoke, as Sweeney's weight sank slowly onto the edge of the bed. She stared forward into the darkness, unable to suppress the enormous grin that spread across her face, unable to quell the surge of butterflies erupting in her stomach.

The springs of the mattress creaked ever so faintly. She felt his legs sliding forward on each side of her, delving beneath the blankets…she felt his arms slipping beneath hers, coming forward to wrap tightly around her waist, encircling her from behind, pulling her back to lean against his chest. His face was beside hers…his chin fell forward to rest wearily over her shoulder.

She couldn't help it. She giggled.

His arms closed tighter around her. She could feel the soothing, steady beat of his heart, pulsing through her back. She let her eyes fall closed, turning her head to lean against his. She inhaled deeply, the masculine, indefinable scent of his hair and skin intoxicating, thrilling and sedating all at once. His eyes were closed, his breathing rhythmic. She knew that he must be every bit as exhausted as she was, if not more.

Still smiling…_she could have possibly erased that smile, even if she wanted to…_she extricated one hand from her lap, lifting it to gently caress the side of his face. She turned and placed a small, slow, gentle kiss on his cheek.

"Y'alrigh' there, Mr. T?" she asked quietly, almost playfully, the sublime happiness bubbling up out of her and broadening her smile even further.

He did not answer her question.

Instead, he pressed his face closer into the crook of her neck and whispered four soft, throaty words into the darkness.

"I love you, Nellie."

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He felt as her body froze…as she became perfectly rigid and still in his arms.

He smiled quietly.

He held her more tightly against his chest, almost chuckling lightly to himself at the stunned stillness of her body. For a full minute, she seemed utterly paralyzed, scarcely so much as breathing.

When she finally spoke, her voice was nothing more than a faint, breathless whisper, barely audible…an exhalation of the soul. The utter shock and disbelief in her words were almost tangible.

"What did you say?" she breathed, trembling, into the dark.

He only leaned forward, nuzzle his face softly against hers.

"Go to sleep," he answered.

He felt her trembling. Her heard the gentle sounds of her gasping, felt the tears streaming quietly down her cheeks. He lifted his hand just long enough to tenderly brush them away. He pressed a single kiss into the line of her jaw.

"Go to sleep, Nellie," he repeated.

She didn't speak again.

She sank lower in his embrace, turning to rest her head on his shoulder…and she cried, mutely, for almost a whole hour before finally drifting off to sleep, wrapped securely in his arms.

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_I love you, Nellie._

The moonlight beaming into the room was faint…almost too faint to make out the glimmering reflection in the mirror across the room.

Almost.

Sweeney looked up, his gaze drawn as if by an invisible hand. He narrowed his eyes. He squinted into the dim reflection looking back at him, and saw…

…himself.

Pale skin. Black eyes, sunken…like dark sockets. His wild hair. His cold, naturally scowling lines…the lines that would never change, not for the rest of his life, no matter what he did.

The reflection of Sweeney Todd. The reflections of Nellie, asleep in his arms, and Toby, asleep in her lap. The three of them, together in the mirror.

_A family._

The voice drifted plain and quietly through his head, and he knew….he knew, without having to think about it at all….that it was the last time that voice would ever be heard by anyone.

_Thank you.…Sweeney Todd. And….goodbye….I suppose._

He didn't quite smile…but the corner of his mouth turned up in a dull, calm sort of sleepiness.

_No, Barker…it's not really a goodbye at all…because you're not really going anywhere. You said it yourself._

_Deep inside…no matter what…we'll always be the same man._

An invisible face…a face he didn't see…a face he could only feel, as it began to fade into nothingness…as it blended into the darkness inside of him….smiled.

Benjamin Barker smiled.

_Take care of them, Todd. _

_Family is the dearest joy you'll ever know in this world._

The face disappeared.

All was left in silence.

And Sweeney Todd stared forward, calm, and thoughtful, for only a few moments longer, before falling asleep, with his new life…_with his new love_…cradled safely against his heart.

_I love you, Nellie._

A/N; Alright, I'm going to be honest. Looking back on this chapter, I'm a little afraid that it gets too sappy. Am I right? Am I wrong? Review and tell me what you think!


	38. Chapter 38

A/N; Whoot! Chapter 38 finally, finally up!! I'm going to bite the bullet and apologize in advance…again. This is sort of one of those necessary plot-catch-up chapters, and there are some looooong bits of dialogue ( including the longest single monologue of this entire story so far! I imagine you'll know it when you see it ). And alas, unfortunately, I couldn't fit a great lot of Sweenett action in this segment either…but fear not! I promise, the final few chapters are going to be more or less completely devoted to them. I'm also going to do my very best not to beat a dead horse and drag this story out longer than I should...my goal right now is to cap it all off in 40 chapters even, 41 at the very most. I thrive on your patience! Hope this chapter doesn't suck too monumentally!

Disclaimer; I own nothing, you own nothing. It's 5:50 in the flipping morning. Strength for a clever disclaimer, I have not.

Chapter 38

_We Could Get By_

or

_He Has Hope_

It was warmth…an instantaneous flare of blossoming heat, slowly accumulated from hours and hours of tented closeness…that woke him up.

Sweeney blinked groggily, narrowing his brow, blinded momentarily by the brilliant white sunlight flooding through the window. The chair sitting in the luminous beam was empty…Anthony had most certainly woken up and abandoned it, returning to Johanna's adjacent room while they slept.

In the full light of day, the small hospital room seemed larger and paler than it had last night, and he noticed a few quaint little pleasantries in the furnishings that had previously escaped his attention…the brightness of the brass doorknob, the not-as-shabby-as-they-could-have-been muslin curtains, the single framed painting ( an amateur's work, to be certain, but a nice gesture nonetheless ) of horses in a wheat meadow, the white porcelain washbasin on the nightstand.

The nightstand. As he squinted blearily at it, gradually drifting up from his deep, deep haze of sleep, Sweeney noticed the little round face of the clock sitting less than three feet from his face. He stared at it for a few seconds, reading the numbers, but not quite yet able to comprehend them in his sleep-dogged brain. He leaned his face forward, and after another half-moment of dazed thought they finally sunk in….it was twelve seventeen.

Sweeney frowned in disbelief. _Twelve seventeen?_

He could not remember the last time he had woken up as late as twelve seventeen…or even as late as _eight, _for that matter. It had been his nightly routine, during the long, lonely months above the pie shop---_how distant those days seemed, now….like the memory of another age, another lifetime---_to sit up long after the rest of London was in bed, standing indolently at the dark window or staring mechanically at his folding picture frame for hours, turn in listlessly in the wee hours of the morning…not because he was truly tired, but rather because he was blearily restless…and then wake involuntarily at dawn, and, totally incapable of falling asleep again, pace the room like a caged lunatic until it was time for Mrs. Lovett to amble upstairs with his breakfast ( which he barely ever touched ). Looking back on it now, he realized---with a blank, curious turn of his eyes toward the plaster ceiling, his tangled head flopping limply back down on the ballooning pillow---it was nothing short of astounding that he'd found the energy to function at all, eating and sleeping as insanely little as he had. He quite literally could not remember the last time he'd woken up after passing a regular, healthy night's sleep in a regular bed.

As he stared peacefully up at the ceiling contemplating this novelty, the swelter of heat that had drawn him out of sleep in the first place reappeared. Sweeney's mouth twitched against it, briefly wondering why he was so warm…he craned his neck, lifting his head to glance down his supine body, and the immediate tickle of coarse, curly hair against his face reminded him, in a single flash, of everything that had happened last night.

He didn't quite smile…but one corner of his mouth hooked undeniably in a faint expression of…_happiness?_

_Happiness? Him?_

_Well….stranger things had happened, he supposed…._

Smiling his half-smile, Sweeney---with some difficulty---worked his right hand out from beneath the small of Nellie's back and gently brushed the coppery spirals of her hair off his face. She groaned contentedly in her sleep, squirming only slightly before resettling against his chest. Her head lay nestled on his shoulder, one arm tossed across his torso, the other somehow snaked in a humorous contortion around his neck, her limp hand buried in his hopelessly matted hair (_ how had he not noticed that sooner? _). Her lips were parted minutely, and the familiar sounds of her buzzing feminine snore were like a therapeutic lull in his ears. He let his eyes shut softly for a moment, his hook-smile straightening faintly as he listened to her thick breathing, felt the slow, rhythmic palpitations of her heart against his side, the soft press of her un-corseted flesh through the double-layer of hospital nightclothes, the shape of her ribcage tucked in the crook of his arm.

_It had been so long, so long….he'd forgotten what it was like, just to hold someone…to even __**touch **__someone…without cringing, without flinching away….without fighting to suppress his vicious, gnawing guilt, to silence his wailing conscience as it howled Lucy's name in his ear…._

_It was peaceful._

_It was…._

…_.nice._

A sudden, jerking kick against his leg made his eyes widen and his brows raise in surprise. He struggled to crane his head up again---nearly immobilized as it was by Nellie's---and with his free left arm he pushed back the comforter, relieved that a great portion of the perspiring warmth lifted from him when he did. The hook-smile quirked again.

He'd almost forgotten about Toby. The boy had managed to wriggle himself half in-between he and Nellie and half sprawled on top of them. His face was all but obscured by Nellie's nightgown, his skinny limbs wound haphazardly in the folds of fabric. He was still wearing his own dirty clothes...a stark, but somewhat comforting contrast to the impersonal, off-white bleach of the hospital-issued sheets and garments. Though his breathing was silent, his mouth also lolled open in the blank, unconscious stupor of deepest slumber. _Like mother, like son, _Sweeney chortled silently to himself.

For what felt like a long, long stretch of time---though when he next turned to glance at the bedside clock, it had in reality been only eleven minutes----Sweeney simply let himself lay there, imprisoned contentedly in the bed by his family, totally ignorant of how to extricate himself…and, remarkably enough…not really caring in the slightest. His eyes drifting closed, he sought out Toby with one hand, spreading his fingers through the boy's dirty, rumpled hair…_funny, how often he seemed to find himself doing that…_and gently pulled Nellie closer to him with the other. She gave a blunt, unladylike snort in response and rolled as far onto her stomach as their position allowed, nudging her face into the crook of his neck. His smile threatened again. Sweeney turned his head so that his nose was buried in her hair and inhaled her clean, earthy smell.

_It had been so long…_

…_.too long…._

…_Nellie….how much sooner….if not for my damned foolishness….my blindness…how much sooner, could we have been….?_

His thoughts were interrupted by a polite, timid knock at the door. Sweeney's eyes popped open.

"Mr. Todd?" he heard the familiar squeak of Daniel's voice, muffled through the wall.

He froze. His jaw opened as if to answer, then hung in blank silence. His eyes darted down to Nellie and Toby, pinning him helplessly to the bed, then back up to the closed door. Much to his own surprise, a sudden bubble of warmth burst in his stomach and spread rapidly through his chest, traveling all the way up his neck and into his face, actually making him blush. In that single moment, Sweeney Todd made a startling ( or perhaps, not so startling, if one really thought about it ) discovery about himself…although, deep down, it was equally likely that he had been aware of it all along.

He was utterly, hopelessly, and incomparably….._shy._

Daniel's voice sounded again, accompanied by a slightly louder knock.

"Are you awake, M-Mr. Todd? Mrs. Lovett? It's more than half past noon."

The doorknob turned experimentally and set Sweeney's heart leaping into a wild, spasmodic flutter. He had no idea why, but the thought of Daniel Northing walking in to discover him snuggled in one relatively small bed with Nellie and Toby, nuzzled together under the blankets like a family of rabbits, filled him with a sweltering embarrassment he had not experienced in…well…_ever. _It wasn't as if he was ashamed, he just…just…_blushed, _plain and simple, at the mere thought of it. Maybe he had simply been retracted too far into the shell of his heartless indifference for too long. Maybe he had simply not quite been able to convince himself that all of it…_Nellie, and Toby, and Johanna, and…himself…._that all of it was really happening, that it wasn't all some cruel, unspeakably heavenly dream. Whatever the reason, he was gripped with the immediate urgency of prying himself out of the sleeping clutches of his bedmates. His mouth worked soundlessly for another moment as he desperately began trying to disentangle himself from their arms, the red flush on his skin brightening with each passing second. Had he not been overtaken in the sudden throes of his unexpected bashfulness, he might have laughed out loud at himself for sheer ludicrousness.

"Ah…one…one minute…" he croaked feebly, managing at last to wriggle out from Nellie's arm and sit upright, then wincing at the stuck position of his legs. Nellie groaned in protest and rolled to her other side, tugging the blankets with her and burying her face in the pillow. Sweeney's heart leapt into his mouth…he instantly seized the opportunity, flinging his legs from the blanket the second they were free. Unfortunately, he had seized the opportunity a bit _too _eagerly. His eyes widened as he felt himself sliding off the slick, threadbare sheets….in his periphery, the door cracked open and in peeked the timid face of Daniel Northing, just in time to witness Sweeney Todd sprawling onto the floor with a very stunned expression on his face.

"Mr. Todd?"

_THUNK ._

Sweeney hit the floor like a bag of rocks. Ceiling lamps in the room beneath them probably shook. In a last ditch effort to save himself, he managed to grab the corner of the nightstand, but succeeded only in wrenching the wooden piece along with him, jerking it so violently the half-dozen glass bottles rattled noisily and toppled over, and the washbasin jumped like a live creature to the very edge of the table. Sweeney watched it, from flat on his back, for one horrible instant as it teetered on the precipice…he heard a faint gasp of alarm from Daniel, and footsteps hurriedly crossing the room, but it was too late…the large---though mercifully empty!---porcelain bowl and pitcher timbered sideways and hit the floor with an earsplitting _CRASH! _shatteringprecious inches away from Sweeney's face.

Daniel halted in mid-step, his arms, which had been extended forward in hopes of catching the porcelain missile, falling limply to his sides. Sweeney jerked his head around, and the two stared blankly at each other.

Nellie and Toby had jerked simultaneously at the crash of the washbasin. The former rolled to her back, jumping bolt upright in bed and tossing her head all around as if she'd just felt the tremor of an earthquake. Toby propped himself up on his arms, looking bleary and confused, until he noticed Sweeney's foot. He blinked groggily at it, following the leg with his eyes…he crawled to the edge of the bed and hung over it, staring down at him. A blank, only half-cognizant smile spread across his face.

Nellie copied him, leaning over to stare at the very silent, disheveled, and flustered-looking barber spilled out on the floor. Her hair was a mass of frizzy copper curls, tangled and flying off in every direction, hanging about her face in stringy tendrils. Her deep brown eyes, still glazed and dewy from sleep, narrowed down at him in an expression of dim scrutiny, her lips parted in the beginning of a silent _What the…? _Her white, scoop-necked nightgown was partially unbuttoned and had slipped innocently off of one shoulder.

And he…well, there he was. Sprawled flat on his back on the wooden floor, one arm spread eagle above his head and the other clinging to the edge of the nightstand---upon which the glass bottles and lamp still trembled audibly---and one leg still propped up on the mattress, his bare foot sticking up in the air.

For one frozen, silent moment, the four of them stared at each other…or, rather, the three of them stared at Sweeney, and he stared at Nellie's bare shoulder.

Sweeney blinked once. Twice.

Nellie pressed her lips together. Her eyes widened and her mouth trembled as if she was struggling fervently…and failingly….to contain a great swell of emotion. She lifted one hand to her face and her bosom jerked spastically beneath the nightgown.

No one moved. The hot blush that had begun at the bottom of Sweeney's stomach seemed to have crept all the way to the roots of his hair. He swallowed, his face blank, his body frozen in its limp position. Blinking, he cleared his throat.

"Good….morning," were the first words he heard mumbling tonelessly out of his mouth.

That did it.

Toby was the first to burst out laughing. He stared down at Sweeney unapologetically, his shoulders shaking with halting, boyish howls of amusement. He let his head hang down over the edge of the bed, his face hidden, his back bobbing up and down. Daniel eased into a low, cautionary chuckle shortly after him, escalating quickly into hearty, good natured laughter. He straightened up, chortling, lifting his hand over his eyes.

Sweeney's blinking black eyes locked for an instant longer with Nellie's shining brown orbs…she clamped the hand harder over her mouth, the lines around her eyes crinkling as she failed to stifle an enormous grin…and then, finally, she too lost the battle. She pulled her hand away and burst forth in a long, sustained note of high pitched elation, stumbling down into gasping cackles of joy. She squeezed her eyes shut, gasping and snorting with uncontrollable laughter. She and Toby rolled back and forth slowly on the bed, rollicking with amusement, scarcely able to breathe. For more than a solid minute, the three of them were beside themselves, their gales of laughter filling every last corner of the room.

Sweeney was just about to open his mouth when the sudden jiggling of another doorknobdrew his attention to the other side of the room. He tilted his head backwards to stare at the door to the adjacent room as it swung open, two pairs of stocking feet---one half-covered by the blue hem of a dress, and walking on the ceiling, as it looked from his upside-down view---stepping across the threshold and coming to a surprised halt. His eyes traveled up…or rather down…to look at Anthony and Johanna's astonished faces. It was less than a few seconds before they too cracked into stifled smiles and barely contained sniggering.

"We…heard a c-crash," Anthony stuttered, clearly struggling to keep from bursting out laughing. "Are you…_ha…_are you a-alright…M-Mr…." he could contain it no longer; he and Johanna both broke into fits of mouth-covered giggling.

Sweeney turned his face back to stare at the ceiling, his expression wide-eyed and completely blank. He could do nothing except blink….blink, and marvel at the fact that his life had come to such a point where this sort of scene even fell within the realm of the possible. And despite the distinct heat still flushing beneath his ears, neck, and face….greatly to his own surprise….Sweeney felt the hook-smile once again creeping up on him.

Nellie's voice, broken with gasps of laughter, drew his attention back to the bed.

"Are you…are you alrigh', lu-_huh-huh-huv?_" she choked, tears practically squeezing from her eyes even as she leaned over the edge of the bed to offer him her hand. He took it, lips pursing in a firm line as she helped hoist him from the floor. He winced at a slight _crick _from his lower spine; his leg slipped off the mattress and he sat upright, pressing a hand to his back and shaking himself minutely.

"Fine," he mumbled in reply, trying to sound cross…but his heart wasn't in it.

Anthony and Johanna had come further into the room…Anthony stood beside Daniel, Johanna delicately seated herself at the end of the bed, and was watching him with a warm, secretive smile that he did not fail to notice. Her gaze bombarded him with a great jumble of emotions at once; he wanted suddenly to go to her again, as he had the night before, but immediately thought better of it…the presence of other people in the room put a distinct muffler on the fledgling bond between them. Feeling abruptly awkward and ridiculous sitting on the floor, Sweeney braced himself against the nightstand and rose sheepishly to his feet, wincing one eye at the poor shattered fragments of the porcelain washbasin.

"No worry, Mr. Todd, no worry…" Daniel chuckled, sliding the wooden chair behind him, down into which he gratefully sank. "They've plenty more where that came from, I'm sure. I do hope it wasn't I who startled you so?"

A last round of faint snickers circled the room. Sweeney mentally shrugged them off, still irked….and, frankly, amazed…at the persistent warmth still lingering in his face.

"No matter," he muttered, attempting to put an end to the subject. He looked up to speak, but upon seeing the ring of expectant faces looking back at him, became abruptly tongue-tied. Instinctively---without even thinking about it----he turned immediately to Nellie, his eyes pleading silently for help. She smiled back at him, the laughter still lingering in her bright eyes…she had dark purple bags under them, and her full lips were still slightly pale and bloodless from the long night…her hair looked quite literally like a mass of knotted red wool, spraying lopsidedly to one side of her head….yet, he felt as if she had never looked lovelier as she turned to Daniel and said, in a cheerful, throaty voice, still scratchy from the night's sleep, and rattled from her recent bout of cackling laughter….

"Well, what's the news, love?"

Sweeney felt a surge of relief….and an odd, unexpected desire to run his hand across that pale shoulder exposed by Nellie's slipping nightgown…when all eyes turned away from him and pointed instead toward Daniel. The young constable cleared his throat, removing his cap and holding it in his hands. His voice was bright and sharp, and surprisingly devoid of any stutter at all.

"Oh, yes, of course!….what I came to tell you, was that I've just been down to the offices this morning…offices of the Yard, that is…to see what's to be done about our…ha…our…_interesting _situation."

The room was suddenly dead silent and serious, every smile vanished. Sweeney cast an eye in Nellie's direction and saw that she had, unconsciously perhaps, put one arm around Toby, pulling him to sit upright beside her, her eyes eagerly fixed on Daniel.

"You…you don' mean they _know about us, _love?"

"Oh, no, no, Mrs. Lovett, not at all! Well, I mean….that is, they do _know _about you, but you see…the fact is…well, the…the fact of the matter is, that…they…well, they….they think you're _dead."_

Sweeney and Nellie's jaws dropped in perfect unison. They stared speechlessly at the constable for a long moment.

"_Dead?" _Sweeney heard himself echo tonelessly.

Daniel nodded gravely. "But you see…it's not really _you _they think are dead, it's…well, I mean, it _is _you, it's just not…I mean, it isn't…"

His nervous stutter was threatening to creep up again. The five of them waiting patiently for Daniel to swallow and collect himself, breathing deep before beginning again.

"You see…Scotland Yard…for the time being, at least…believes that Sweeney Todd and Eleanor Lovett are dead. All they know about _you_ is that you've both been hospitalized with serious wounds as a result of the shootings and the crash, and have as of yet been unavailable for interview. I made certain the hospital informed them of that."

In the corner of his eye, Sweeney saw Nellie's squinting expression of open-mouthed confusion, and was sure it was a mirror of his own.

"But Daniel, what do you mean, they…Daniel, if they think Sweeney Todd an' Eleanor Lovett are _dead, _then who in the bloody 'ell do they think _we are?"_

A tiny fraction of his visible nerves melted away long enough for Daniel to look at her, his eyes twinkling with a mischievous light Sweeney had yet to see in them, and smile softly.

"Nathaniel and Emily Copperwait, of course."

A repeat of Sweeney and Nellie's simultaneous jaw drop. Daniel actually looked as if he had to stifle a nervous laugh at their expressions.

"'Ow…'ow in the _world…?"_

"Your papers, Mrs. Lovett. The papers we found when searching for you…they've been looked over and over by the Yard, and as of yet they've found no reason to doubt their legitimacy---and especially now, with Mr. Connor's credibility all but evaporated---the Yard has accepted as a working theory that the fugitives the investigation was following, from the village on, were the _wrong people. _For the time being, Mrs. Lovett…you are not Mrs. Lovett. You are Emily Martha Copperwait, with your husband Nathaniel Evanston Copperwait, and your son _Christopher_ Evanston Copperwait."

Nellie was shaking her head in disbelief, and he couldn't help but feel a small, brief swell of pride when she leaned toward him and muttered under her breath, "_Brilliant _forging, love."

Sweeney simply stared in mute bafflement, a thousand questions firing in his mind all at once. He groped blindly for half a minute before at last catching hold of one.

"But…Daniel, how can they…what do they think happened to Todd and Lovett, then?"

A grave expression clouded the young officer's face as he turned to look Sweeney square in the eye.

"Do you remember a man named Jack Bonnegen, Mr. Todd?"

Sweeney clenched his jaw, the mention of that name sending a violent shudder running up and down his spine, his mind immediately filled with the inescapable memory of Jack's steaming blood pouring over him…the soft _thud _of his stiff corpse falling in the snow as Sweeney rolled the dead body off of him.

"I'm sure you're…er…already aware…of the two dead bodies discovered at the cabin where Mrs. Lovett was arrested."

Sweeney's brow narrowed in realization. "Daniel…you can't mean…"

The constable only nodded gravely.

Sweeney shook his head in disbelief. "But how could they possibly conclude that _he…_he, and that poor girl, are…_were…_?"

Daniel sighed lightly. He suddenly turned, crossed the room, and gently closed the door to the hallway, then returned to stand somberly beside the bed. He drew a deep inhale and let it out slowly, as if preparing himself for a great expenditure of effort.

"The offices of Scotland Yard are a strange creature indeed, Mr. Todd," he said quietly, his face pointed to the floor. "Much of the time its nigh impossible to try and make any sense of their convoluted judgment. However, in this instance…well….to be frank, Mr. Todd, they're simply desperate for an easy way out. You've no idea what kind of strain this wild goose chase of Connor's has put on headquarters…they've been fed up with it from the beginning, the Beadle never had any real grounds on which to start it in the first place…and now, what with this business of his arrest, and the hospitalization of the…er…_Copperwaits…_well, they were practically _gnawing _at the bit to accept the first scapegoat explanation they could find. When I gave my mandatory report last night on Connor's conduct of the investigation---all of the officers involved have given one----I mentioned the two bodies that had been found at the house in the country, and that the former Beadle Connor had failed to notify any proper authorities---another offense added to his list of charges, you can be sure---well, let me tell you, Sergeant Garrises nearly fell backward in his chair. _'Well, by the saints themselves, Northing!' _he shouts to me, his face red as meat, _'Who's to say __**they**__ aren't Connor's bloody 'murderers?' Have they been identified?' _I told him we believed the man, at least, to be Jack Bonnegen…but when I said it was Connor who'd made the distinction, he ordered that a party be sent out to retrieve the bodies and make a proper investigation of the matter. It was almost five this morning when the news returned, and when the Sergeant heard that it was a petite woman and a middle-aged man, both fitting the most general descriptions of the wanted posters, and both with faces rendered all but unrecognizable, well…_'And tell me the odds of __**that **__being a coincidence!' _he roared_…._the Sergeant nearly made the official declaration then and there. So you see, my friends…even as we speak, Scotland Yard is at fast work on the proposal that Sweeney Todd and Eleanor Lovett, after burning down their own pie shop---and indeed, _that's _come under speculation as well…they're saying now that we have no real evidence at all that it was even youwho set fire to the place---fled to the country, passed through the same village and inn where the Copperwait family happened to be staying, and then holed up in that farmhouse, where one of them unfortunately murdered the other, then committed suicide. They're leaning toward the idea that Lovett shot Todd, and then herself…the trajectory of the wounds lends itself so. And the poor Copperwaits…whom, through some terrible error, the former Beadle believed to be the culprits of his imaginary crime…were simply innocent victims caught in the madman's crossfire."

Five pairs of eyes stared unblinkingly at Daniel. He looked up, noticed the intense drill of the multiple gazes, and hastily cleared his throat, turning his cap in his hands.

"That…er…well…th-that's the….the Y-Yard's…th-theory, anyway."

A long, blank, deafening silence filled the room in the wake of Daniel's tremendous speech. Sweeney's mind was racing…he felt as if he were running behind it, straining to keep up…he could do nothing but sit, staring in blank disbelief.

It was, quite surprisingly, Anthony who first found his voice and broke the silence. They had been so utterly quiet until that point, Sweeney had nearly forgotten that he and Johanna were there.

"But…Officer…_Daniel…_that…that's ridiculous!" the sailor stammered incredulously.

"I made a full confession," came Nellie's soft, toneless voice, airy and disconnected. Sweeney glanced at her from the corner of his eye…her face was drawn in an expressionless stare, her eyes wide and unblinking. "You were _there, _Daniel…there ain't no coverin' it up, I _confessed, _to everythin!"

The constable shook his head. "Connor's arrest nullifies all of it. Even _without _his arrest, that confession never would have stood…the signature was clearly forged, there was no impartial witness, and it was conducted totally without legal authorization."

"What about you and I?" Sweeney demanded, still unable to believe what he was hearing. It was all just too lucky…too suspiciously fortunate to be possible. "What about our little play for Connor and the other policemen? I _told them myself _who I was…and besides, if Sweeney Todd truly was lying dead somewhere out in the country, how on earth could he have taken a hostage and stormed the House of Records the following night?"

"The business that went on in the Hall of Records is one muddled blur from beginning to end, Mr. Todd," Daniel answered. "None of those four constables---and they've been drilled time and again about it, every one of them---have been able to give a clear description of you…at least, they've not been able to put together a single unified picture. I'd scarcely believe it if I hadn't been there myself, the wild variations they've come up with…one of them says you were a wiry, seven-foot tall albino with a black wig, another says you were five-foot five and at least seventy years old…still another claims that his memory has blanked out your face entirely. And the stories of the hostage scene change with every retelling. If I didn't know better, I'd honestly believe that their memories have been scrambled out of plain fear…but to tell you the truth, Mr. Todd, I think each of them is intentionally perjuring themselves just to further discredit Beadle Connor. Every policeman in the Yard seems to have turned against him since his arrest…any who weren't against him from the beginning, that is. But it doesn't matter what the reason…at this rate, half of the officers' testimonies will be stricken out of sheer incontinence. At this point, for all the Yard knows, it could be any lunatic off the street who stormed the Hall, threatened the Beadle, and took me hostage."

Sweeney blinked in disbelief. "But what about _you_, Daniel? What about your testimony?"

A faint smile turned on the young man's mouth, and Sweeney saw again the distinct gleam of Puckish deception.

"Oh, that's simple, Mr. Todd. I never got a clear look at your face at all…I was trapped with my back to you the entire time, you see. My throat would have been slit to ribbons if I'd so much as _glanced _toward you."

At that specific mention of their farcical hostage act, Sweeney noticed for the first time the small bandage taped over Daniel's throat, and was reminded painfully of his own hand in causing the minor injury.

"But it still doesn't add up," Anthony rationally protested. "I addressed Mrs. Lovett by name, the officers _heard _me!"

"An' don' they think it's just a _bit _odd that a woman who was arrested, _shot _in the bloody leg, an' nearly _bludgeoned _'alf to death would never _once _think to speak up and tell them they'd got the _wrong ruddy person??" _Nellie pointed out dubiously, tangling her fingers into her hair and slouching with frustration. "An' what of these bloody wanted posters? 'Asn't anybody noticed that these _Copperwait _blokes look an awful lot like them _as well?"_

"It all sounds too good to be true, Daniel," Sweeney blurted out, tailing at the end of Nellie's exasperated demands.

"I know, I _know, _believe me, I _know_!" Daniel started defensively, holding his palms toward the floor, motioning for calm. "Trust me, I've thought over every possible angle of this wretched affair a dozen times, and _ridiculous_ as it seems…." he sighed, running a hand through his hair and exhaling. "You've…you've just got to consider it from the Yard's point of view. Here's Beadle Connor, a man whose credibility has been slowly crumbling for _years, _making all sorts of outrageous orders for this wild investigation of two so-called fugitives and murderers…neither with any criminal record to speak of…and after days and days of reckless law-breaking and gallivanting about the countryside, there's an unauthorized imprisonment at the House of Records, ending in an awful accident in the street and a terrible public scene…along with attempted _murders, _and torture, and _scores _of other crimescommitted by an unstable public official…and a handful of bruised and badly injured civilians, each with _legitimate _documentation proving that none of them are a one Sweeney Todd _or _Eleanor Lovett! Unreliable testimony from a battered bunch of officers and a sketchy stack of wanted posters are not _nearly _enough to put a sunny outlook on that!"

Nellie narrowed her eyes, a line of shadow from the window frame striping across her face and intensifying the subtle glimmer of hope beginning to flash beneath the surface of her stare.

"Are you telling me, Daniel," she said quietly, her eyes slowly widening as she slid the covers away from her legs and turned to put her feet on the floor, "Are you telling me…after all this…after _everythin'_ we've been through…that we're…that we're truly, _'onestly…."_

"Free?" Toby's faint voice finished her sentence, the boy sitting abruptly upright, his back rigid and his eyes as wide as saucers, shining, unblinking, not daring to believe it.

There was a moment of deafening, palpitating silence.

The mischievous grin faded and was replaced with a calm, simple smile, revealing only a minute portion of the happiness that was welling in Daniel's eyes, and he nodded….once, quietly.

"Yes."

Then suddenly, for some reason, the constable was staring straight into Sweeney's eyes, and his smile straightened.

"But….we don't know for how long."

By all reasonable right, those dark, solemn words of premonition should have plummeted down into the pit of Sweeney's stomach like bricks…but they didn't. Quite the contrary; he felt as if he were floating. An intangible, euphoric numbness seemed to have filled his entire being…Toby's voice, the softy uttered _"Free"…..free, free….for the first time, in sixteen years….to be truly, honestly, free…._it echoed in his mind, drowning out any possibility of dread or anxiety. He stared back into Daniel's eyes as he spoke, his voice light and detached…the words rolled off his tongue as carelessly as wisps of smoke.

"We have to run again."

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

Nellie closed her eyes.

_Free._

_Don't look a gift horse in the mouth, I s'pose…._

…_.but oh….oh, God….to __**run **__again?_

She didn't know how, but even through the red darkness of her eyelids she could feel Daniel gravely nodding his head. Her right hand squeezed just a little bit firmer on Toby's shoulder as her left traveled slowly up to hold her reeling head.

_We have to run again._

Just five words. Five little words. And yet…_oh, God….God in heaven….the weight, the unholy, unspeakable weight that those words carried…._

_Running, running….always, always, running! To never be safe, to never be __**home**__…it was a lie, this relief, this freedom, it was nothing but a pathetic patch on an eternal wound…they would forever be running, every miserable day of their miserable lives….they would never be free…._

Just as she felt herself beginning to slide down into a black pit of hopelessness, of an exhaustion so complete it bordered on despair…something pulled her back.

She opened her eyes.

It was Sweeney's hand on her knee. He had slipped it there so discretely and quietly, no but her could have noticed. Her eyes darted up to his face, but he wasn't looking at her…his eyes, blank and unfeeling---save for a quiet, stern look of determination that seemed to radiate strength back into her very soul---were fixed on Daniel. His hand suddenly tightened on her knee, grasping her firmly, as if to communicate words…

_I'm here. I'll always be here._

_It will be alright._

She practically welled up with tears on the spot. She stared at his bruised, bandaged profile, her heart pounding, lost in his beautiful black eyes…

…_he pressed his face closer into the crook of her neck and whispered four soft, throaty words into the darkness…. _

"_I love you, Nellie."_

Her hand closed over his, and her lips parted in a mute gasp of longing.

_Oh, Sweeney…._

Daniel's voice was filtering distantly through her ears…she barely managed to tear her eyes from his face long enough to listen. She wanted to seize him in her arms right then and there…had his hand been a single inch higher on her leg, she was positively certain she would have been unable to resist the temptation…she would have tossed all propriety to the wind and pounced on him without a second thought, present company notwithstanding.

_It was amazing…there was no other word for it…amazing, how quickly he could turn her heart from trudging miserably in a slow, listless beat, to throbbing so hot and violently it made her face flush, just thinking about it…_

"Yes…I'm…afraid so," Daniel was saying. She forced herself to pay attention to his voice. "You're out of the fire, as of now….I'd even go as far as to say you may well be out of it forever, if luck hold, but….it's…it's simply just too big a risk for you to stay here in London…to stay in the _country, _I'd go so far as to say. Even if Beadle Connor is sentenced to _death _for his crimes…even if Todd and Lovett's, er….'corpses,' are _never _identified---which, unfortunately, I'm quite certain they will be, perhaps sooner than we hope---there are too many loose ends to be looked into. My greatest fear is that the Yard will demand testimonies from the Copperwaits…even if I _could_ somehow wrangle the position of interviewing you myself, protocol demands that it take place at the station…I would never be able to keep the other officers from seeing you at least once…and I fear their foggy memories may take a decidedly clearer turn, Mr. Todd, should they see your face …no…you're safe, for now, but we can't take the chance of you being around when the Yard goes digging deeper into this mess," he swallowed, turning his eyes suddenly to the floor.

"I…I'm afraid you have no choice but to leave," he said quietly. "You have to leave London. You have to leave…_England._"

"Leave England," Nellie heard a voice echo softly, tonelessly…seconds later she realized it was her own.

Daniel turned further away.

"Possibly…..forever," he nearly whispered.

_Forever._

A heavy, pregnant silence stiffened the room. The wintry afternoon sun blazed brilliantly through the glass, a thin, false cheeriness of yellow and white. Outside, the snow-covered rooftops of an entire civilization lay stretched out before them, dirtied with the soot of a thousand chimneys.

_London._

Chimneys, everywhere you looked, an endless forest of chimneys…the amber-red stacks of the factories, the filthy dark pipes of slums and tenement houses, the princely brick necks and crowned, stone mouths of wealthy mansions…each belching a constant stream of smoke, day and night, gathering into a perpetual haze of smog that hung over the city like a widow's black veil. The fat, winding brown snake of the Thames, cut through the jungle of buildings like a varicose vein, its invisible stink permeating ceaselessly along the waterfront districts.

The spider web network of patched, cobbled streets and alleyways, teeming with an endless supply of vermin-like occupants…a veritable rainbow spectrum of humanity. The pickpockets, barefooted children, most of them, darting in and out of their dark hiding places like so many scuttling rats. The tradesmen…grocers, tailors, potters, weavers, butchers, locksmiths, blacksmiths, scissor-smiths, shop keeps of all species…each of them trudging along through their daily toils like human mules, glancing up only long enough to grunt half-hopingly in the direction of a prospective customer. The whores and brothel-girls…mingling dully around brick corners and seedy pubs, waiting for night to fall and their business hours to begin…and shamelessly scrubbing, in broad daylight, the dark, interminable stains from their stockings and underwear in public water troughs. The thieves, muggers, and vandals. The pimp, the homeless rapist…the distinguished-looking gentleman, actually a closet-pervert, stealing away from his noble mansion and frigid wife for a secret visit to the bordellos and the opium dens. The weary priests, the defeated-faced clergymen, the sour-tempered old nuns…all bitterly aging soldiers of an eternal, losing battle.

And lost somewhere amidst them all, wandering like brainless little lambs through a bustling slaughter---the one in a thousand miracle---the honest, the innocent, and the naïve. A happy family, strolling through the park…euphoric newlyweds, pecking in the coffee-shop window…a well-cared for child, tugging at its nanny's skirts.

_London. _

_England._

_Home. The only home she'd ever known. A corrupt cesspit…a filthy, stinking hole, a blemish on the face of humanity…._

…_.but it was home._

Nellie calmly, quietly, stood up. The mattress creaked softly, the her bare feet padded the floorboards. Her fingers traced, just briefly, along Sweeney's shoulders and she moved to stand in front of the paned glass and stare, silently, through the hospital window. Her pale, wearied face was half-reflected in the transparent shine as she gazed out over the dirty city…over the familiar streets…over London…over her _home. _The only home she'd ever known…the only life she'd ever dreamed possible for herself.

_To run._

_To leave London.…to leave __**England**__…possibly, forever._

The sun was bright and warm against her skin. Gently…tiredly…she let her heavy eyelids fall closed, her arms folding in the soft, dingy fabric of the nightgown. She leaned forward, unknowingly, until she felt her forehead just barely grazing the cold, smooth surface of the glass. She heard the creak of the floorboards, the small scuffle of a chair. She felt a hand, big, rough, gentle…slipping over the back of her neck. She felt Sweeney's still breath behind her, imagined, as clearly as if she were seeing it, the soft-eyed expression of concern writ on his face.

With her eyes closed…with the warmth of the sun and the warmth of his hand filling her, calming her…with the whole of London---of her entire life, every day for thirty-four long, grey, _long, _years---spread out, like a living blanket, beneath her…

….Nellie smiled.

_No. This __place wasn't home._

Sweeney's hand squeezed gently.

_That._

_**That **__was home._

_And unlike London…that could go anywhere she did._

Nellie opened her eyes, straightened up, turned around to face Sweeney and the others, each of whom, to her faint surprise, was pinning her with the same worried, anticipant gaze. Sweeney moved his hand from her neck, holding it in mid-air between them, his eyes watching her with a lost and pleading look.

She smiled at him. She looked past him, to Daniel, to Toby, to Anthony and Johanna. She smiled at all of them.

"Good riddance to it, then."

Five pairs of eyes blinked in unison…five sets of lips parted in the same faint motion of hope and surprise. Sweeney stared at her, the realization creeping over his face, until he was almost smiling back at her, the lights of greater emotions that he was yet incapable of expressing darting like shooting stars in the black depth of his eyes.

Nellie's smile broadened into a confident grin, her chest suddenly feeling as if it had been relieved of a small, dim weight that had pressing secretly on her heart for…oh, God only knew how long.

"This rotten ol' isle's become downright dull, these days, any'ow," she winked over his shoulder at Toby, who broke into an enormous grin. She looked back at Sweeney. "Yes, sir, I'd say a nice change o' location's exactly what we need to liven us all back up. In fact…there's somewhere I been meanin' to go an' visit, for quite some time now…sort of 'ad my 'eart set on it, you might say. Maybe I've mentioned it to you, Mr. T," she said coyly to him, her eyes twinkling with an almost fiendish smile. "Think you might know the one I mean, love?"

He smiled at her. Sweeney Todd…._her _Sweeney Todd….eyes and mouth and scowl and all…actually smiled at her.

"I may have an inkling."

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

It was nearly twenty minutes later, when the small, sunny hospital room was alive with a chattering collection of eager, excited voices…Nellie's, Daniel's, and Anthony's, all batting back and forth in a ceaseless exchange of wide eyes and hand gestures….that Johanna caught Sweeney's eye.

He was sitting again in his straight-backed chair beside the window, listening to Nellie and the others' tactical discussion---perhaps not quite as intently as he should, but a strange cloud of elated sensation was fogging his mind ( could it really be? _happiness, again? ), _half stopping his ears_---_he noticed her, sitting properly with hands folded, at the end of the bed. Her mouth was a hard, firm little line, her chin notably pointed and her enormous grey eyes watching him with a strange, almost sad distance that made him pause and look more closely at her. He narrowed his brow, almost mouthing _what's wrong? _silently with his lips, when he suddenly realized everything about he and his daughter that had gone unsaid before the present company. He realized with a start of delayed surprise that Anthony had not even so much as approached him about the somewhat significant discovery that Sweeney was, in fact, his new father-in-law.

Johanna gazed at him a moment longer, pools of light quivering in her eyes…she anxiously bit her rosy bottom lip, her hands twisting in her lap…and all of a sudden, she turned swiftly to Anthony, who had taken a seat beside her to talk to Nellie and Daniel. She laid a hand lightly on his shoulder…he immediately halted in mid-sentence and turned to her.

"What is it, Johanna?" he asked innocently, attentively. Sweeney thought he saw a faint flicker of guilt pass across his daughter's face…but the next moment it was gone, replaced with a slightly pained expression.

"My head's just begun to ache a bit, dear, and I feel a little warm," she murmured quietly, wincing a little and pleadingly squeezing his shoulder. "Would you mind…Anthony, would you mind terribly running to fetch the nurse?"

"Of course not!" the sailor ejaculated in a shocked whisper, seizing her hand in both of his and pressing his mouth to it. "Why didn't you ask sooner? I'll be back in an instant!"

The young lad was up and out the door in a flash…Johanna craned her neck to watch him leave, and the moment the door to the room shut behind him her gaze darted back to Sweeney. She calmly, but quickly rose to her feet and went to bend down beside him, whispering politely in his ear.

"Mr. Todd, may I speak with you alone for a moment?"

Sweeney blinked, taken aback by the painful twist of his heart at the utterance of the curt, formal, words.

_Mr. Todd? _

He glanced at Nellie. She and Daniel were so deeply immersed in conversation, they appeared not to have noticed either Anthony's disappearance or Johanna's whisper. With an uncomfortable stiffness filling his chest---and a very abrupt feeling of foolishness at the blowsy hospital pajamas he was still wearing---Sweeney nodded once, rising to his feet. Johanna immediately seized him by the hand and led him hurriedly through the door and into the adjoining room. Sweeney saw, for a split second before she closed it, Toby's face turned in their direction, his ears perked and his chin lifted curiously. Then, the door was shut with a brisk _click…_Johanna whirled around to face him, and before he could so much as open his mouth she had pounced at him, seizing the front of his shirt in her fists and burying her face in his chest with a quiet, repressed wail.

Sweeney froze for a minute in open-mouthed shock before quickly wrapping his arms around her. They stood silently for a moment, she leaning heavily against him with her face hidden, he holding her gently and wondering what in the world was going on.

"Johanna," he finally found his voice, though it came out only as a feeble murmur. "What's the matter?"

She lifted her face, her cheeks rather flushed, as if from embarrassment…he had half expected her to by crying, but her eyes were dry. She cleared her throat, stepping back a few inches and smoothing the front of his clothes with her palms.

"I'm sorry, I…I've just…been wanting to do that all morning."

It was Sweeney's turn to blush. He coughed once, an odd expression twitching across his face. He lifted one hand and stroked a tendril of hair at the side of her face…she smiled sadly up at him. What she said next made his hand freeze like a statue and his heart muffle a beat.

"I've decided not to tell him."

Sweeney's lips parted, a pulse of surprise that wasn't wholly surprise jerking through him. For one jolted moment he could only stare at her blankly, his dark eyes quizzical and searching. Even before he asked her the first question…deep down,he had already known. Perhaps he had known since the moment she first caught his gaze at the end of the bed.

"Why?" he whispered plainly.

Johanna swallowed, turning her eyes away, her face brimming with hurt, and at the same time filled with a cold, tearless resignation. She moved past him to sit softly down on the edge of the bed. He followed her, and the instant he was sitting beside her she leaned her head on his shoulder and found his fingers with hers.

"It isn't because I don't love you," she said firmly, her voice wavering in its resolution to be strong. "…and it isn't because I don't want you as a father. You mustn't think that, not even for an instant. And it isn't because I'm ashamed."

Sweeney looked down at her, his eyes narrowed. _Yes. He'd known this was coming…even before she'd caught his gaze in the other room. At the very center of his mind, the very bottom of his heart, he'd known this was coming the instant she'd cried out his name and thrown herself into his arms the night before. He'd known, all along. _

_It was meant to be this way._

She turned her eyes to his face, reaching to him, pleading with him to understand. He wished there was a way to tell her he already did, but his voice had again left him for the moment---it seemed to be growing more and more unreliable these days---and he could do nothing but listen, and stare wordlessly, falling forward into those pools of luminescent grey.

"It's because…I don't want to hurt him, father."

_Father. _It was nothing short of miraculous, the effect that single word, uttered in her tender, fragile voice, produced in him. He closed his fingers tightly, her tiny, doll-like hand lost inside his. She looked away, her head falling again against his shoulder.

"Anthony, he…I don't know if I can explain it…he's just…he's not like us. He's not like anyone I've ever known. He's…he's innocent, father."

_You are young….life has been kind to you…._

Oh, if only Sweeney could somehow go back in time and stop his bitter, hateful old self from muttering the next words…

_You will learn._

_No. No. You should never have to learn._

"He's so…just so _trusting_," Johanna continued, her voice drifting into a distant lull, her eyes fixed on some invisible image of Anthony in her mind's eye. "He truly believes that at the heart of everything, there is some good…that in spite of all the vile, horrible things he's seen, that the world is still a good and decent place. He's just…_innocent, _incurably innocent_."_

_There were some things he would never be able to tell them. That look---the look of hope, in Anthony's eyes---he couldn't let it fade away. _

Johanna leaned more heavily against him.

"Can you understand what I mean, father? He has _hope. _He has more hope than anyone I've ever met. Do you understand what I mean?"

In spite of himself and the pained, suspended ache in his chest, Sweeney smiled faintly and found his voice again.

"I think I do."

"You know I love you, father. I…don't even know who you are, and yet I'm certain I love you, more certain than I've ever been about anything. And I've waited my whole life to know you…I've dreamed about you, and wished for you, and now…now, when I've finally found you…."

Her voice began to break up, her chest catching with impending sobs. The ache in Sweeney's chest grew tighter, and he disentangled his hand from hers so that he could put his arm around her shoulders. She eagerly fell into the embrace as the first choking cries began to stifle her speech.

"…and now….now, we can't…we can't even be together."

She gasped, tears budding in her eyes.

"Johanna---" he said quietly, trying to comfort her…but she cut him off, clearing her throat and forcing her voice to be strong.

"No. There's nothing else you can do. You…you have to leave. You have to go where you'll be safe. And I, we...we're going to stay. Daniel said that Anthony and I are free…entirely free from it all. Anthony's given him our statements, and he says we're free to go whenever we please. We struggled so hard to afford our house in the Downs, father, _so hard…_and we…we have our whole life together, there, _here,_ in England…we can't go. We can't."

She looked up at him…the tears shining in her reddening eyes only made the catch around his heart cinch even tighter.

_This is how it's meant to be, _he told himself. He knew it was the truth…he knew it was the only way....and yet, it did nothing to make the pain any less real.

"And I can't tell Anthony the truth," she whispered, her voice trembling. "You don't know what you mean to him, you don't know the way he thinks of you. You're…you're as much a father to him as you are to me. If he were to find out, if he were to…to know, the things you…the things you t-told me…it would destroy him, it would destroy the part of him that….he wouldn't understand…he's innocent, father, he wouldn't understand, if…if he knew…that you lied to him, that you…the things you've done, the things you're sorry for…he would never understand. And with you leaving, and…I can't, not now, not ever…I can't tell him the truth. As much as it hurts, as much as I want him to know…as much as I want, to…to be your daughter…._I can't_."

She fell suddenly silent, lifting her hand to her mouth, a shudder racking through her small body as she sobbed mutely. Sweeney sat there, holding her, feeling her shake, gripped by a terrible, numbing helplessness. _She was right. There was nothing else to be done._

_This was the way things had to be._

_She couldn't tell them him truth. She had to let him keep his hope._

"_Can you understand what I mean, father?"_

_More…more than you could ever know, Johanna._

Quietly, gently, Sweeney ruffled her golden hair, his eyes blank and listless, the pain in his chest not quite dissipating, but rather fazing slowly into a muted blur that spread through his limbs in an apathetic resignation.

_This was the way things had to be._

He didn't know why, at the time…but as he sat there, listening to her quiet cries, comforting her silently….he found the means to smile.

_Maybe…she was more like him than either of them realized._

"Yes you can," he suddenly heard himself whispering gently.

She paused, sniffling, looking at him with quizzical eyes.

"What?"

"It doesn't matter who knows it, Johanna. It doesn't matter if you never decide to tell him. And it doesn't matter if...I don't know when I'll see you again."

He softly, gently, leaned close to her, his eyelids lowering...a still, ethereal sort of calm fell over him, and he discovered that the words he was whispering were the honest, unalterable truth.

_"You'll still be my daughter."_

She looked at him, her eyes limpid with tears…the sun from the window streaming through her long hair, illuminating it in angelic hues of gold and yellow…she looked at him, for a silent moment, and then, unable to find the words, fell back against his shoulder, her arms latching around his, holding for dear life. She shook with noiseless cries. Nothing more needed to be said.

_You'll be my daughter._

_No matter what._

A/N; Yyyyup. There it is. Like I said…you have my promise of better chapters to come. If need be, work out some frustration in a screaming review ( to me, _any_ review is a good review! ^_^ ).


	39. Chapter 39

A/N; Hooooo, boy. Sorry for the wait on this update…good news though, this is the longest chapter of this fic so far! 24 word pages! It was going to be even longer, but I figured I'd save the rest for next time and get the update posted sooner. I've got to be honest, I'm glad this fic is ending soon, because I am starting to get _majorly _burned out with this thing. I've been slogging through tons of work and homework lately, and this chapter was _so _much more difficult to write than I expected! I'm still going to do my absolute best to finish it off with a bang, but geez oh man…I am _exhausted. _Anyway…don't let my wheezing and panting ruin the chap for you. Enjoy!

Disclaimer; I don't own Sweeney Todd. You don't own Sweeney Todd. AND I HAVE NOT SLEPT IN TWENTY-SIX HOURS. I AM NOT JOKING.

Chapter 39

_Sail the World, and See Its Wonders_

or

_A Barber and His Wife_

The poor, sleeve-rolled, harried-looking nurse, whom Anthony had all but dragged into the room---giving Sweeney and his daughter scarcely enough time to jump apart from their fatherly embrace, which would have appeared very inappropriately intimate for a young woman and an "older friend of her husband," with whom she'd just recently been acquainted---felt Johanna's forehead for a full minute and, with a barely-concealed flare of annoyance, pronounced her perfectly without fever. With an exasperated sigh ( one got the sense that she had dealt with one too many rich, finicky, private-room patients in her day ), she muttered, "Take some water, lie down, and find someone else to bother!" and stormed briskly back out into the hallway. Anthony looked as if he were about to become angry, but Johanna quickly silenced him with the assurance that she was indeed feeling much better than a moment ago.

"Just my silly nerves, I suppose, shut up in this place all day…might very well have imagined it. No need to fret, darling," she shrugged wistfully. She shot Sweeney a private, hopeful smile just as he slipped discretely away, quietly shutting the door and leaving she and her flustered, slightly confused, but nevertheless contented husband alone in their room.

Daniel and Nellie were still eagerly discussing the plans and preparations to be made for their flight from England…both were seated on the edge of the bed, making slight, rapid hand gestures between them, and so absorbed in the conversation that neither of them glanced up when Sweeney reentered the room. He noticed, with a very slight grunt of approval, that Nellie had fixed the fallen shoulder of her nightgown and buttoned it all the way to her throat.

Toby had risen to his feet and was standing at the window, the ends of his messy hair lit with the streaming sunlight of late afternoon. He quickly turned his head at the sound of the door closing and shot Sweeney a broad, excited smile. Sweeney returned it with a faint quirk of his mouth, crossing the room to sit down in the straight-backed chair and let out a long, weary exhale. He'd scarcely been seated half a moment before Toby assaulted him with talk.

"Y'alright, Dad? 'Ow's your guts? Better?"

Sweeney nodded, blinking at the boy's sudden energy.

"You sure? Stitches alright? Daniel said they bloody near 'ad to flay you like a haddock to get the bugger out. Nasty business, 'e said. Sure you feel alright? Stitches don't 'urt you, do they Dad?"

Sweeney half-smiled, half grimaced at the pierce of Toby's eager concern. "They're fine," he assured quietly. He had never seen the boy this lively…he wondered if perhaps this was the way Toby was with Nellie when he wasn't around…so…_happy_, so young, so innocently carefree, even for a child who'd lived through as much pain and ghastliness as he had. That notion was quickly followed by a sharp stab of guilty memories. He had always been so cold, so indifferent, so unkind to the boy; save for when he needed an errand run, he'd paid Toby about as much attention as he would a fly crawling on the woodwork. Was it only now, after everything that had passed between them, that the boy felt easy enough to open up a bit?

Sweeney's half-smile fell into a wistful glaze of melancholy as he looked at Toby's innocently grinning face.

_Couldn't exactly blame him…. _

"Nurse was in a moment ago…said they've saved the bullet in a jar, said I could 'ave it to keep if I wanted. Could I, Dad? Do you think I could keep it?"

The smile crept up again…sadly, guiltily.

"You can keep it," Sweeney said, a strange catch in his voice.

Toby's grin spread wider. "It's a bloody_wicked_ thing, Dad, don' know 'ow in _blazes _you managed to move about with it…thing's bigger than a mouse, nurse said 'alf an inch deeper an' it would 'ave split your liver like a---"

"Toby," he interrupted suddenly, without thinking. The boy paused in mid-sentence.

"What?"

Sweeney felt all at once sheepish and awkward, almost cowardly…he cleared his throat, sat up straighter in the chair, his hands twitching nervously---_God, he was pathetic__at this! _It was at that moment that he realized just how out of fatherly practice sixteen years had really made him. With Johanna, it was she who had made all of the advances toward contact…when it came to _him _havingto initiate even the littlest gesture of affection, Sweeney found himself practically sweating. In a cracked, feeble voice, he croaked out…

"Come…er….come…sit with me."

Toby blinked. His smile faded and his face went blank with surprise. He didn't move…he stood there at the window, arms limp at his sides, gaping as if he couldn't believe his own ears. He blinked again…Sweeney felt his palms nearly beginning to sweat.

"You mean it?" the boy muttered in an incredulous half-whisper.

Toby made no movement, and the small remnant of Sweeney's courage flushed out of him all at once. He immediately lowered his hands and looked away, feeling old and foolish.

"I…never…never mind---" he began to mumble…but something in the corner of his eye made him stop. He looked back at Toby…the boy was grinning from ear to ear, and a soft light of unspoken emotions was shining in his big brown eyes. Before Sweeney could open his mouth again, Toby had turned and dropped so heavily into his lap it rattled his knees…he instinctively put his arm around the boy's shoulders to steady him, and Toby leaned against him without a moment's hesitation. Sweeney's heart thudded in his chest, a flush of heat erupting through him…he turned to stare blankly out the window, not knowing where else to look. Toby relaxed into him, his legs spreading lazily, his arms falling limp. For a long, long moment, they sat there…father and son…and gazed together through the window over the grey, sunny streets of London, listening contentedly to Nellie and Daniel chattering nearby.

"Dad," Toby's voice sounded presently…calmer than before, even sleepy somehow.

"Yes," Sweeney answered---his chest still pounding…it was even more powerful than he remember, this fatherhood business…if he wasn't careful, between Toby and Johanna, he'd damn near give himself heart failure---his fingers tightening on Toby's shoulder as he leaned against his chest.

"I nearly forgot…I got somethin' for you."

Toby reached his small hand inside of his jacket, and after feeling clumsily for a moment, drew out a smooth silver object, flickering in the sunlight. Sweeney looked down at it, his heartbeats gradually slowing. A lump caught in his throat…he slowly lifted his palm, and Toby pressed the warm razor into his hand. Sweeney closed his eyes…his fingers shut around it. His other arm hugged tighter around Toby…but he could think of nothing to say.

"I'm sorry…I forgot to give it back 'til jus' now."

Sweeney kept his eyes squeezed shut…he was afraid, suddenly, that if he opened them, they would be wet…and nodded gently.

"That's alright," he whispered.

"Anthony lost 'is. In the crash. 'E told me yesterday, while you were laid open downstairs…I think 'e was afraid you'd be angry."

Sweeney squeezed his hand tighter around the folded blade, and realized for the first time that he had lost his third remaining friend as well. He had dropped it in Fleet Street after…Beadle Connor….and he'd failed to get it back before he fainted and was spirited away to the hospital.

Slowly, cautiously…he opened his eyes and uncurled his fingers, looking down at the glistening silver shape in his palm.

The only one left.

He waited. He gazed down at it…and waited.

After a long, still, throbbing moment, he realized that it wasn't going to come…the hurt, the sadness he'd expected. He had lost all of them, all of his friends but one, and yet…he felt no grief, no remorse. He felt nothing at all…nothing…except…

Gently, he lifted his other arm and wrapped it loosely around Toby, hugging the boy softly close to him. Toby slid down further in his lap, letting his head fall to rest against his shoulder.

"Thank you," Sweeney said. His voice was strangely calm.

"Dad," Toby said again, nearly sounding as if he were about to doze off.

"Yes," Sweeney answered, again.

"I 'eard Mum and Daniel say we're goin' to go someplace far away…all the way across the ocean. In America."

Sweeney closed his eyes and couldn't help but smile.

_America._

_Let me guess…_

"They say we're goin' someplace called Virginia….to a town called Norfolk. Daniel's got a cousin there."

His smile broadened.

_Let me guess…a cottage, by the sea._

_I suppose I did promise you, Nellie…_

"Do you think it'll be nice, there?" Toby muttered absently, his voice trailing off, his eyelids fluttering dangerously.

Sweeney looked up, and at that instant he happened to catch Nellie's eye. She paused, her mouth open in mid-sentence…her eyes widened, and for a fleeting second she gaped at he and Toby in surprise…then, a slow, understanding smile spread across her face, and she beamed at him as if she'd never been prouder.

_Maybe…with a little practice…he could get better at it. Being a father again._

"I think it will…son," he whispered, just as Toby fell limp---_asleep, again_---against him. "I think it will."

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

Sweeney watched somberly, his eyes squinting and his mouth puckered with disdain, as the obnoxiously cheerful young shop-keep behind the counter verbally counted out his change, dropping the half-sovereigns one by one onto the wood, each clanging _chink _making him flinch a little further.

"Seventeen…eighteen…nineteen…there, we are! Five an' twenty," he smiled brightly, at last straightening up and dusting his hands off on his shoe-polish-smudged apron. "And a fine day to you, sir!"

Sweeney nodded curtly, forcing a clenched, grimacing smile as he swept the pile coins into his palm and hurriedly turned out of the cobblers' shop. _A half-pound…more than a bloody __**half-pound, **__for two miserable pairs of boots! Damn things'll probably fall apart in six months, for the bargain… _

Frowning in a flat, disapproving line, Sweeney grudgingly shifted the package underneath his arm, the brown paper crinkling noisily. The yellow, midday sun fell across his face as he stepped out onto the bustling walk, the air chilly and pleasantly brisk. He squinted in the bright light for a moment, tugged the broad, stiff brim of his hat down further over his eyes, and straightened the dark scarf that kept his disturbing, stitched-up throat safely concealed. He then turned and slipped inconspicuously into the flowing foot-traffic, the crass, noisy Londoners ebbing around him like the current of a river. No one wasted so much as a second glance on him…he was once again just another blank face in the teeming crowd…and yet, he couldn't for the life of him dispel the squirming, uncomfortable feeling deep in his gut, the creeping suspicion that he would somehow be recognized…that no matter which way he turned, he would run smack into a policeman, or maybe even a former tonsorial regular who would recognize his face. He never did, of course…but still…

_Almost four days since they'd left the hospital, and_ _he still couldn't get used to it…the comings and goings of a normal life. Just to be standing out in the open, unhidden, in broad daylight…he simply couldn't attune to it again. It was like the intangible sense that one gets when putting on a borrowed shirt that doesn't quite fit…the sense that no matter how well he managed to cover it up, no matter how craftily he breathed, or shrugged, or shifted this way and that to try and fit back in, there was no escaping the fact that he…well…that he simply just didn't belong._

_Didn't belong…_

Daniel had wisely advised them to limit their shopping to only the poorer, more densely crowded districts…they'd find fewer police there, as well as more than enough cover to blend in with. The immediate neighborhood of Dunstan's Market ( providing, of course, that they keep well away from the direction of Fleet Street ) would be an easy place to move about unnoticed, and would offer them an ample venue to procure all the belongings they'd need for the voyage. However, Daniel had also recommended, timidly, that Sweeney refrain from removing the tall black hat he'd lent to him…"_No offense, Mr. Todd, but that hair of yours, well…it…ah…it does have a way of standing out in a crowd…."_

True, there was no immediate danger of their being discovered by the police---they weren't being looked for, anymore, and even if they were, they were no longer the wanted murderers Todd and Lovett…they were just poor, innocent, bullet-ridden Mr. and Mrs. Copperwait, only recently released from their three nights' stay at the hospital. And besides, what were the odds of _anyone_ spotting two individual faces out of the teeming thousands mingling around the market square?----but…still…it didn't hurt to be careful.

Walking slowly and continually tilting his shoulders to avoid bumping into the jostling passers-by, Sweeney kept his face down and his package clutched close beside him. He found himself frowning deeper and deeper every time he felt the press of the stiff leather shapes…_half pound! Ridiculous…_he couldn't shake himself of the unpleasant feeling that he was a thief and a beggar.

"_I'm not asking you, Mr. Todd. I'm __**telling **__you."_

"_Johanna, please don't be so brazen! If he'd really rather not accept it, then it's his deci---"_

"_No, Anthony," she had cut him off sharply, pinning him with a piercing glare before turning back to Sweeney. One of the crumpled, smoothed-out papers was clutched firmly in her delicate hand…the other, which had moments ago been a legal contract of the Yard, was now nothing more than a pile of ashes on the plate where Daniel had burned it, thin curls of smoke still rising into the air. "This isn't a request. He's going to take it."_

"_Johanna!" Anthony started, mildly appalled. "You…you can't just __**force**__ charity on someone!"_

"_I won't take it," Sweeney repeated blankly for perhaps the thirtieth time. He shrugged in stern, simple finality. "I won't."_

"_Then neither will I!" his daughter retorted curtly, crumpling Judge Turpin's will into a ball and tossing it on the floor between them. Sweeney raised one eyebrow at it…yes, there was definitely a great deal more of his personality in Johanna than he had bargained for. He lifted his eyes to her, his jaw clenched, his voice struggling to remain calm. Despite his frustration at her stubbornness, the moment was almost sentimental, in a way. It was, after all, his first fight with his daughter. _

"_It's your inheritance, Mrs. Hope!" he argued, gritting his teeth and forcing himself to use her formal name. "It's your lawful right. I am not going to take that away from you."_

"_I won't touch it!" she cried, narrowing her eyes at him. "I won't touch so much as a __**shilling **__of that monster's money if you refuse! It belongs to you as much as me. If not for you, I would never have gotten it! If not for you, I…I wouldn't even be here!"_

_His heart had stopped abruptly at the hidden implication of the statement, his gaze shooting automatically toward Anthony…but the sailor wasn't looking at him, he was staring pleadingly at his wife. _

"_Johanna, be reasona---"_

"_If not for you, Mr. Todd, I would be trapped in that awful place yet!" she went on, grey eyes flashing, ignoring Anthony's protests. "I __**want **__you to have it. You can't run away to another country on nothing, and what's more, you have a family to look after! I want to help you, Mr. Todd, I want to…I want to try and repay you, for everything you've done for me…for us…and it's scarcely a fraction of my---of __**our**__ debt to you, can't you see that?"_

_Sweeney shook his head incredulously, her fierce eyes penetrating into his._

"_You honestly expect me to take your living away from you, Mrs. Hope?"_

"'_My living?'" she snorted derisively. "What sort of living do you think Anthony and I want, that we would need __**thirty thousand pounds **__to sustain it??" _

_Sweeney opened his mouth to shoot back a clinching reply, but instead drew an abrupt frustrating blank as he stared at her, one hand at his hip and the other at his forehead. __**She had a point….**_

"_I'm not suggesting you take all of it, Mr. Todd, only half. Fifteen thousand will be __**more **__than enough for Anthony and I to live on….we aren't interested in any extravagances. We love our little cottage in the Downs, and we've got it nearly paid off as it is."_

_Sweeney turned pleadingly to Anthony, but the sailor only shrugged and puckered his brow apologetically._

"_It is true, Mr. Todd. You and Mrs. Lovett need the money much more badly than we do."_

_He turned to Nellie._

"_What about our savings?" he almost begged. "All of that money put away from the pie shop?"_

_Nellie sadly shook her head. "No good, love. The accounts are all in my name….we can't touch them now, not as Mr. and Mrs. Copperwait."_

_He turned to Daniel._

"_Couldn't we….somehow---?"_

"_I'm afraid not, Mr. Todd," the constable agreed gravely. "As of now, the two of you are __**this **__near to being declared legally dead. There would be no hope of going about a withdrawal now, not without giving yourselves away."_

_Sweeney rumpled his hair, exhaling in frustration. Ten eyes watched him from around the room…it was becoming clear that he was hopelessly outnumbered. He turned back to Johanna, looking her straight in the face, his eyes supplicating silently._

_**Are you**__**sure?**_

_Her lips pressed together in a firm line. She nodded without moving her head._

_**I'm sure, father.**_

_Sweeney held her gaze a moment longer…then sighed heavily, letting his arms drop to his sides and his shoulders hang slack. He closed his eyes wearily._

"_Very well, then."_

Now, as he made his way down the street, shuffling timidly through the bustling crowd milling toward Dunstan's market, tightening his grasp on the boots that his daughter's money had paid for, he felt the same pangs of guilt that he had then.

"_I'll pay you back," he had privately promised her afterward. "Every last pound, I swear it…"_

_She had only smiled calmly at him, reaching out to touch him on the arm. "No, you won't. And I'll burn every note you try to send me. It's a __**gift**__, father."_

_A gift…._

Lost in his thoughts and staring down at his feet, the brim of the hat shielding half of his face, Sweeney was abruptly shaken from his reverie as he accidentally knocked into someone from behind, stumbling and dropping his parcel.

"Rotten, son of….watch it, there, you great---!"

But both he and the injured party stopped dead as they turned to face each other. Sweeney blinked in surprise. _Lord…he hadn't even recognized her, from behind, with that…that…what in the world was that thing on her head?_

Nellie's mouth opened in astonishment for a moment, then she grinned and burst into a short spurt of laughter.

"Why, don' I know you, mister?" she chuckled, smiling broadly.

Sweeney rolled his eyes and bent to pick up the brown paper package. "You weren't wearing that this morning," he muttered, peering thinly up at the crown of her head.

She narrowed her eyes offensively, though still bright with amusement. "That's because I jus' picked it up a moment ago at 'Eminglin's. Don' you like it?"

Sweeney straightened up and knitted his brows at the staggering, slant-brimmed concoction of felt, glass beads, paper flowers, and turkey feathers that he could only assume was intended to be a hat. She had it pinned down over her wild up do, the loose, curly tendrils arranged carefully beneath the brim. His face twisted in silent restraint. When he didn't say anything, Nellie's smile dropped into a deadpan stare.

"Well, by my word, do check your enthusiasm, love," she muttered sarcastically, pursing her lips defensively and straightening the ridiculous edifice of her flamboyant, incorrigibly tacky taste.

_Flippant, as always. Judging by the number of small holes in the felt and the ratted, shabby state of the feathers, she'd gotten it at a bargain, too…his good old, tawdry, frugal-to-a-fault Mrs. Lovett…_Sweeney's mouth quirked in an affectionate grimace…_she'd probably never grow out of her habitual penny-pinching, no matter how much money they had to bat around._

"No matter," she quipped defiantly. "_I _think it's lovely. 'Sides, Daniel said we ought to try an' blend in."

Sweeney fervently bit his tongue to keep himself from blurting out that about the only place that hat would help her to blend in would be a burlesque house full of peacocks. Instead, he cleared his throat and lifted the brown parcel for her to see.

"Boots," he murmured in explanation. "Pair for you, pair for the boy."

"Ah!" she nodded, lifting her head and peering through the mingling market crowd. "That reminds me, the little bugger ought to be back any moment. Sent 'im for…ah, there 'e is!"

Nellie turned to move a short distance away, toward where Toby was eagerly weaving his way through the throng. As Sweeney watched her, he felt his heart give a notable twinge, and he flinched with each gentle _tap, clunk, tap, clunk, tap, clunk, _as she gimped lightly on the wooden cane the hospital had given her. It was the only means of which she was able to walk on her recovering leg…but it still pained him every time he was reminded of it.

"Got everythin' on the list, mum," Toby reported somewhat breathlessly, holding up his wrapped purchases.

Nellie beamed, playfully scuffing the top of his head. "There's my good lad! 'Spose that's all of it, then…ready to shove off, Mr. T---er---Mr. _C?" _she turned over her shoulder, shooting him a wink.

Sweeney exhaled, reflexively pulling the brim of the hat down as far as it would go. Rather than answer, he took Nellie by the arm and firmly, but gently, began marching her through the square, Toby hurrying behind. She leaned on him with each limping step…he paused for just a moment to resituate the boots beneath his elbow so he could hold her with both hands.

"You ought to have let them give you the chair," he muttered absently, the _clunk, clunk, clunk _of her cane twitching in his ear. He caught himself glancing furtively at her skirts, wincing at the thought of the bandaged leg gimping achingly beneath them.

Nellie snorted and laughed as she reached back to take Toby's fingers in her free hand. The boy caught up and walked beside them as she looked back, still chucking indignantly.

"What, and 'ave you an' To---_Christopher,_ wear yourselves to the bone pushin' my crippled ol' arse 'round on wheels all day? Just 'cause I _look_ it, don't mean I'm 'elpless _yet, _Mr. Copperwait."

Even as Sweeney blinked at her coarse language, he could suppress the faint urge to smile…and all at once, he felt the spark of something he had not felt in…oh, in an eternity…in a thousand years. Something that he hadn't felt since the last time he'd fallen into bed with Lucy, Johanna soundly asleep and deaf to their hushed snickers….something he had long since been certain he would never feel again in his lifetime.

_Good God….it was playfulness!_

_Didn't belong?….no….maybe, when it came down to it…he really didn't. Not to London, not to England. Not to the world. Not anymore._

_But he could belong to __**her.**_

Quietly enough so that Toby couldn't hear, he leaned toward her---practically ducking to avoid the brim of her hat---and whispered…

"Allow _me _tobe the judge of your 'crippled arse,' _Mrs. Copperwait_."

He took great pleasure in keeping his nonchalant gaze fixed dead ahead as Nellie turned to stare at him, mouth open, her pale cheeks blushing a phantom shade of flabbergasted pink.

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

Daniel---bless his heart, _Daniel! _how could they ever hope to repay him?---lived by himself in a

tiny apartment in west London, on the third floor of a large, dour brick building that rang night and day with the sounds of creaking floorboards, harping women, and wailing infants. He had only two rooms to his name…a little grey matchbox of a bedroom, a just slightly larger space that served as kitchen, parlor, and dining room, and a dark, cell-like water closet that was too miniscule to rightfully be considered its own room. To his credit, Daniel kept the humble flat as orderly and spotless as a young man living alone could hope to keep it…but Nellie found herself smiling with private amusement, as she looked around at the grease-spotted stovetop, the dingy, wrinkled sheets on the unmade bed, the little collections of dust in the corners, the unwashed laundry hanging out of drawers, the dirty mugs stacked on the table. The place…_and likely_, she mused, _Daniel himself, the shy thing_…was in clear want of a woman's touch.

It was in these humble, doll-sized premises that the six of them---Nellie, Sweeney, Toby, Anthony, Johanna, and Daniel---had passed the last six days, crammed in together like a pack of sardines. There was only one bed, and it was just slightly large enough for Nellie, Johanna and Toby to fit in together…both Nellie and Johanna had protested fervently against this arrangement, Nellie especially despising the fact that it left Sweeney and the other men with nowhere to sleep but on an awkward collection of Daniel's dining table chairs…but it had done no good. The men were stubbornly vehement in their insistence that the women and Toby be given the bed.

Daniel spent most of the daylight hours out, either at work for the Yard or busily making travel arrangements for the 'Copperwaits.' Sweeney, Nellie, and Toby were to depart from London on the first of January, on a passenger ship bound, among a list of other American landings, for the little seaport town of Norfolk, Virginia.

"My cousin, Fitzwilliam Northing," the constable, bent over a sheet of paper with his pen scribbling diligently, explained to them one evening as they all sat crowded around the lamp-lit dining table. "…he's been a businessman and contractor in America for almost four years. I'll send him the letter, enclosed with the money for your house, on a post clipper, and if our luck holds with the weather, it ought to arrive at least four or five days ahead of you. I'll explain everything to him, everything about our…er…situation…and I'm certain he'll be able to find you a place to live. He'll understand. He's---he's a good man, Fitz. An _honest_ man."

Nellie had smiled warmly at him, her elbows on the table and her chin propped in both palms.

"Bein' kin of yours, Daniel, I could 'ardly imagine 'im otherwise."

She'd managed to get a small, very shy grin out of him with that.

Their days together in those rooms passed in a quaint, quiet…and, most strangely of all…very _relaxed_ atmosphere. With Daniel out nearly every day, and leaving them with strict instructions not to leave the flat without first informing him, and even then to do it only as was absolutely necessary----_simply wiser not to take any unnecessary risks_…and Nellie honestly had to agree----they found themselves, for the first time in what felt like half a lifetime, with a great deal of free time, and very little to do with it. The routine they inevitably fell into consisted of little more than long, languorous napping, interrupted at varying intervals with meals and comfortable, half-hearted conversation. Indeed, it soon became a very seldom occasion that all five of them would be awake at any given moment during the day…they used Daniel's bed in shifts, drifting off at noon, waking for lunch, dozing again before twilight.

_Strange….so strange, to have nothing to do, no immediate danger to be evaded….to be able to wake in the morning in the same place she'd gone to sleep the night before, and to know that she would be going to sleep there again that night….to feel __**safe**__. Nellie felt as if she had half forgotten what 'safe' was._

They had managed to purchase nearly everything they would need for the voyage in one day out at market ( their new suitcases and clothes sat patiently stacked between the little stove and the cupboard, making the room feel even smaller than it already was ) and after that, had nothing to do but wait for the first…for the day when they would make the final leg of their journey, when they would run for the last time….when they would leave London, and England, and the past…behind them forever.

It was on a dark, drizzly afternoon, when Daniel was out…Anthony and Johanna were together on the bed, looking over something or other from Daniel's tiny book collection…Toby was drawing something at the table with a little box of crayons she'd bought for him…and she sat in one of the dining chairs, staring idly out the window at the dirty street below, falling half-asleep from the drowsy, blanketing heat of the oven fire, her head leaning heavy into her palm, when Nellie realized it. She was happier, and more peaceful, at that single, quiet, crowded, empty moment, than she had ever once been in as long as she could remember.

_Happiness, _she mouthed the word silently, musing over it with half-lidded eyes as she gazed through the glass, watching the drops of water go trickling down.

_Happiness…._

_But…_

_No…wait. Something was wrong….something was missing._

_What?_

Immediately realizing the answer, of course, Nellie suddenly lifted her head, looking curiously around at the four walls of the miniscule kitchen. She turned to Toby, who was bent over and fully absorbed in his drawing. She would have smiled to herself as she looked at him…._first time he's been able to be a child in heaven only knows how long…._were she not distracted by another sudden urgency.

"Toby," she said thoughtfully, narrowing her eyes as she spoke. "Where's Mr. T gone off to?"

Toby looked up. He turned his head around, blinking in surprise as if he'd just woken up.

"I…I dunno, mum. I thought 'e was 'ere, jus' a moment ago…"

Nellie stood up from her chair, wincing at the jolt of pain in her leg...she seized her cane from the corner, clunking to the doorway and sticking her head into Daniel's bedroom…luckily for her battered shin, she barely had to take a step before she was in the doorway. Johanna and Anthony simultaneously lifted their heads.

"Either of you seen Mr. Todd, dearies?" she asked, a faint note of worry creeping into her voice.

They glanced at each other, then shook their heads blankly.

"I thought he was in the kitchen with you?" Johanna asked, half-rising from the bed. Nellie pursed her lips and shook her head.

_Where had he gone? How had he slipped out without their noticing?_

"Mum!" Toby's voice called from behind her. She turned to look over her shoulder, and he signaled for her to come and look out the window again.

"I see 'im!" he said, pointing down at a sharp angle to the corner of the street below. Nellie hurried over, peering anxiously down through the glass…sure enough, there he was, standing alone on the corner of the street. His lonely shock of white hair stood out like a beacon among the other milling pedestrians, most of them shielded by dark-colored umbrellas…the light drizzle had, within moments, turned to a steady pounding of cold rain. The weather had taken a surprising turn in the last few days…warm enough to change the snow to rain, but still cold enough that deceiving sheets of black ice lingered here and there at the edges of the pavement. Nellie's heart gave a stark, uncomfortable jolt when she saw him standing there, staring out into the street as still as a statue, the sidewalk traffic dispersing around him as nonchalantly as if he were nothing more than another lamppost.

She exhaled thickly and seized her coat from the back of a chair.

"Great, stupid thing…" she muttered, half angrily and half worriedly, under her breath as she crossed the room, throwing her arms into the sleeves. "What in the bloody 'ell's 'e think 'e's doin' out there?"

"Mrs. Lovett, wait!" Anthony's voice called precautionary as she wrenched open the door. "Daniel told us not to---"

"Wait 'ere," she cut him off bluntly, shutting the door with an unapologetic _bang. _Her slippers tapped furiously on the narrow, zigzagging staircase…the cane clunked noisily against the wood, hobbling as quickly as she was able..._bloody stick, how long would she have to use it for, anyhow??..._her lips moved in hushed, indistinguishable muttering as she whirled around the banisters…her heart began to throb uneasily as she reached the small, dark lobby…a burst of unexpectedly harsh wind caught her full in the face as she stepped outside, her breath immediately catching in her chest. She froze for a moment on the stoop before recovering herself, the brave pedestrians passing back and forth in an continuous flow in front of her…she blinked, shaking herself, wrapping her heavy coat closed in front of her as her breath puffed out in thin translucent clouds.

The traffic was a constant movement of shining black and dripping umbrella arcs, and the din of wet, slapping footsteps and the pounding of the rain were all around her….but she peered through the crowd and spotted him almost immediately. He'd not moved from his spot on the corner. Pursing her lips, preparing herself for…for…well, she didn't exactly know what for…Nellie took a breath, as if she were about to plunge underwater, and hurried out from beneath the shelter of the entryway. The frigid rain pelted her mercilessly, soaking into her hair and shoulders, dripping from her eyelashes. She shivered and pulled the coat shut tighter, her teeth already chattering as she weaved back and forth between the passersby. Slowly, she drew nearer and nearer to Sweeney, her jaw going taut in a frustrated clench as she noticed that he hadn't even put on a waistcoat before disappearing out of the apartment…he was still wearing nothing more than the white button-down shirt he'd had on all morning.

_Bloody madman, wandering half-dressed out in the rain like that….catch his death of cold yet! And making me come out in this mess to fetch him, the silly….oh, Sweeney…._

She came up behind him and, without pausing, prodded him forcefully in the shoulder, her brows narrowing in irritation and cold. She was already half-soaked, dark red tendrils of hair falling loose from their pins and clinging to her neck and forehead.

"Penny for your thoughts?" she half-shouted above the noisy patter of the rain, her voice disdainfully sharp.

Sweeney jumped, and jerked his head to look over his shoulder…when he saw that it was her, her turned to face her. She had been wholly expecting him to pin her with a contemptuous scowl, the black, empty-eyed displeasure at being interrupted in his faraway musings, just as he had countless times before in the grey light of his barbershop window…but he didn't. The expression he wore as he turned to look at her struck her so deeply and suddenly, every ounce of annoyance immediately drained from her face and her eyes widened in surprise and upset. He looked…he was…_distraught. _There was no other word for it. His lips were parted in a lost, searching kind of desperation…his eyes bored into her as if pleading, begging for something, but for what, she didn't know. It frightened her when he looked at her like that.

"Sweeney," she said, her voice quiet and alarmed, "What's wrong?"

His eyes narrowed in a suppressed kind of agony. The rain had drenched him through and through, plastering down his dark hair, and wringing into even tighter spirals of wild curl than it normally was. His shirt was unbuttoned at the neck and hung open nearly to his chest…the white material was soaked through and clung, wrinkled and translucent, around his thin frame. Any stranger would have most certainly taken him either for a man bereaved beyond his senses, or a wandering lunatic.

"Do you know what today is?" he asked, miserably, but without hesitation, his voice hoarse and distant, many, many miles away.

Nellie blinked and looked down for a second, trying to think. She realized with faint astonishment that she honestly didn't know…the days they had spent together in Daniel's flat had seemed to pass her by without number or significance…it had all been one warm, happy, tired blur. She moved her lips silently, counting off the dates in her head.

_What day had they left the hospital? Was it…the seventh…no, the eighth…the eighteenth, yes, she remembered seeing it on a little calendar somewhere….the eighteenth, nineteenth, twentieth, twenty-first…_

Nellie stopped in mid-count, her eyes widening as she looked back up at Sweeney's despairing gaze. Her lips parted in disbelief, and her mouth hovered open a moment before answering.

"It's…it's Christmas Eve," she said blankly.

_God in heaven, was it really? How dazed and exhausted had they all been, to have honestly forgotten that it was bloody __**Christmas**__?_

Sweeney stared at her, with that wide, troubled gaze, the rain pounding harder and harder every second they stood there on the corner. He shook his head faintly, in plain distress rather than negation.

"It's the twenty-fourth," he said.

Nellie knit her brow in concern.

"Yes, it is. The twenty-fourth _is_ Christmas Eve, love," she said slowly.

He shook his head again. "It's the day after the twenty-third."

Her brows contracted further.

_What on earth was he talking about?_

"Sweeney…are you alright?" she asked softly, reaching up and pulling the wet tangles of hair from his eyes. He closed his eyes under her touch, taking her hand in his and gently lowering it again. She looked up at him worriedly.

"What's the twenty-third?" she asked gently.

He opened his eyes. He swallowed. The look in his eyes changed, without really changing at all…he abruptly looked as if he'd never wanted more badly to touch her, but was holding himself back, for some reason. His voice went low and toneless as he his grip tightened on her hand.

"The day…the day Lucy and I were married."

Nellie froze. She blinked, slowly, once…twice. She felt her face slackening, her expression going black. She slowly, gently, eased her hand out of Sweeney's and let it fall to her side. They simply looked at each other a moment, the forgotten downpour drenching them mercilessly.

Nellie felt a strange pang in her chest and forbid it from overtaking her. She swallowed, took a small breath, and let it out.

"And?" she asked quietly.

Sweeney face twisted in a mixture of frustration and sadness…he turned away from her, reaching absently into his pocket and pulling out a small object which he began to turn over and over in his hands, staring down at it, his shoulders hunched.

Nellie's eyes softened. The pang wrenched, aching worse and worse with each passing second, but she fought it down. She put her hand on his wet shoulder, moving to stand beside him. She glanced down at his hands…it was his razor, the last razor. He was rolling it continually in hands, nervously flipping it open, then closing it, opening, closing, opening, closing. The dim, grey daylight moved back and forth in a pale blur across the silver shaft. She looked up at his profile, her mouth pursing, struggling to find her voice, and upset that when she did, it didn't sound half as strong as she'd meant it to.

"Sweeney, it…it's alright, if you---"

"The twenty-third of December. _The twenty-third of December," _he cut her off, his voice shaking, the razor turning faster and faster in his hands. "Our anniversary. I've never forgotten it, never…never once, all these years, never _once…_and now…_now, _when…I…I…"

Nellie felt a thick lump forming in her throat, her eyes brimming with hurt as she stared at his pained expression. She squeezed his shoulder tighter.

"It's alright, love," she tried again, a bit stronger this time. "I'm…I'm sure she wouldn't…wouldn't want you to…"

He suddenly looked up at her, jerking his head so quickly she jumped and trailed off in mid-sentence.

"It isn't that," he protested. "It isn't…it's…I…"

He looked away again, stammering as he veritably throttled the razor in his hands. Nellie opened her mouth to speak, but before she could utter a single word he had, without warning, leaned forward and cut her mouth off with a fierce, desperate kiss.

For one, pulsing moment, the rain stopped falling. The footsteps of the passers-by fell silent. Everything stopped…everything became still…for just one dark, searching moment.

He'd pulled back before she fully knew what was happening. Nellie's eyes popped open, her lips parted, her chest jerking with erratic breath. She blinked repeatedly, questioning him with her eyes.

_Sweeney…what…?_

He stared at her, his black eyes terrible with sadness and uncertainty.

"I love you," he said loudly, his voice almost lost in the thundering rain.

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

_He didn't know what it was that made him realize the date._

_He'd just been sitting there, quietly---much as he did every day, it seemed, now….how peaceful it was, how…nice…just to sit, in the quiet----watching Nellie from across the small kitchen table. The stove crackling dully, the stuffy heat of the tiny room. Daniel out…Toby's crayon, scribbling softly beside him…Johanna and Anthony's hushed voices and innocent snickers from just through the door….and Nellie, his Nellie. The pale light from the window illuminated her, cast a cold, otherworldly glow over her white skin and dark auburn hair. She twirled a tendril of it absently around her finger. She let her chin rest in her other hand, her eyes half-lidded and tired, gazing through the glass. _

_The rise and fall of her chest as she breathed….the smooth shapes of her collarbone, the arch of her long neck, the slant of her weary shoulders._

_He'd slipped his hand, absently mindedly, without thinking, down to his pocket, and he felt the small hard shape of the razor through the fabric….and then, all at once, it came to him._

_Today was Christmas Eve._

_He had missed it. Forgotten it._

_For the first time….__**ever**__….he had forgotten it._

_The twenty-third of December._

_The day he and Lucy were married._

_He didn't know where he would go. He only knew that, quite suddenly, he simply could not be where he was…in the warmth and stillness of that happy room, in the same room as Nellie's beautiful pale collarbones. No. Not there. Not in the same room as his love._

_His love….his love…._

_Lucy, oh, God, Lucy….no…he couldn't be there._

_He was a traitor, God, a traitor, twice! But to who, to who?? To Lucy, or Nellie??….or both?_

_He didn't say a word. He stood up, turned, and walked out of the room. He was so silent and so sudden that no one so much as glanced in his direction._

_He didn't know where he was going. He hadn't even stopped to put on a vest. He stopped walking, blinked, and saw that he was standing out on the corner of the street in the pouring rain. He stood there, feeling as if he were on the edge of the sea. He looked out into the busy intersection, listened to the sounds of raindrops and footsteps all around him…but he didn't see or hear any of it._

_He'd forgotten their anniversary._

_And it made him feel guilty._

_And he felt guilty that it made him feel guilty._

_And now, he didn't know. He just…didn't know._

_He loved her. There was no escaping that now, no denying it. He loved her…with a love different from any he had ever felt before. _

_But how….how could he love her, the way she deserved to be loved, if…if…_

…_.if every December the twenty-third, he would still think of Lucy?_

Nellie looked back up at him, clouds of her stunned breath puffing between them. Her hair, now long drenched, hung down and clung in thin, curling tentacles around her neck. Her eyes narrowed in confusion.

Sweeney's heart was pounding. It was as if his consciousness had been severed, his mind swimming in a dazed, thoughtless blur. He didn't think. There was no thought. Only the beating of his heart.

"I love you."

The words were spilling out of him, pouring forth in a torrent of feeling…he'd not felt this in years, he'd not dared to imagine that he still had the _ability _to feel this…to simply _talk, _and let the emotions come rushing out of their accord. He had been standing on that street corner almost twenty minutes now, and yet suddenly, he felt as if he had noticed the rain for the first time. He _felt _for the first time. Nellie's gaze had changed, softened, brightened, deepened with puzzlement. She looked as if she wanted to speak, but couldn't find the right words.

He didn't think. He _felt._

"I love you. _I love you,_" Sweeney repeated, inadvertently stepping closer to her, so that she had to crane her neck further to look him in the eye. _How small she really was, when he stopped to truly look at her….how far below him she was, how perfectly she seemed to fit inside of him…. _"I love you. You know I do, don't you?"

Nellie's eyes were shimmering, now. "Of course I do," she whispered softly.

"I love you, Nellie. You know I love you."

"Sweeney, what's _wrong?"_

His breath was shaking. He wanted to whirl away from her again…he wanted to get away from her shimmering eyes…and at the same time he never wanted to look at anything else again. _He couldn't think…only feel. For the first time in, a lifetime… _

"I forgot…I forgot our anniversary. For the first time, Nellie. I…I _love you, _I don't under…understand, I…_why should it hurt? _Why should it hurt now, if I forget?…._Why did I forget? _Why does it _matter? _I thought, I…I thought everything, and I don't _want to…why does it hurt, now?"_

He couldn't stop them, the nonsensical words. It was like a flood valve had been opened up, and everything was gushing out of his heart in one drowning torrent…his voice was getting louder and wilder, and Nellie's small attempts at interjection passed mutely through his ears.

"I…I don't want…_should I? _I don't want this, but I…how can I just…what should I…??"

And all of a sudden, he had seized her by the shoulders, jerking her towards him, his eyes blazing into hers…and he heard himself blurt it out.

"_I don't want to think about her!"_

There was a stark, sudden silence, like freefalling through midair. The rain pounding. The world passed around them. They stared at each other.

The instant the words left Sweeney's mouth, it was as if an enormous rock settled in the pit of his stomach. He froze, Nellie's face inches from his, her eyes wide and almost frightened as he stared at her, his teeth showing, his chest heaving…_when had his chest started heaving? _He froze…he froze…he realized, gradually, what he had said…and there it was. The truth. The blank, bald-faced truth, staring him in the face.

_I don't want to think about her._

The rock seemed to evaporate in a light, drifting cloud of strange, incomprehensible dread…a surreal fuzziness…and yet, at the same time, a shining light of absolute clarity.

_Lucy…_

_Lucy…God, it wasn't her fault, none of it was her fault! His poor, dear Lucy…she'd had everything stolen away from her, everything. Her husband, her daughter, her very life….all of it, snatched away from her innocent, virtuous hands. She, more than anyone else in the horrid, wretched scheme that was the web of their connected lives, had been the victim._

_And now…now he didn't want to even think about her! He was a monster!_

_And he loved Nellie. He loved her…oh, so much…_

_And it made him feel guilty. _

_And he despised the idea that it made him feel guilty….and he despised the idea that he despised it._

_Nellie, Lucy, Nellie, Lucy, Nellie, Lucy!_

He tried to conjure Lucy's face to his memory…and found that he couldn't.

Sweeney felt himself reeling, felt himself slipping away….a cool, smooth hand suddenly pressed the side of his face, cupping his cheek, and he rushed back to reality. He blinked, breathing thickly. The rain pounded around them. Nellie's hand grew rapidly warm against his skin…she was looking up at him with an expression that he couldn't identify…but she looked…simply…_warm. _Not hurt, or dejected, or angry, or crying…not any of the things he had been terrified of seeing in her. Just…warm.

"Sweeney," she said gently, her voice deep and throaty as she softly traced her thumb across his cheek. "I think…I understand."

He held her gaze. He lifted his hand to hold it on top of hers, and faintly…just faintly…she smiled at him.

"Come inside, and we'll get your coat. There's someplace I think we should to go today."

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

The rain had stopped. The world had become strangely, ethereally silent…the only sound that could be heard anywhere was the sharp, twinkling chirping of the winter birds as they darted to and fro from branch to thicket. The sky was a dim, steadily darkening wash of grey…a thin mist had settled over the ground. It was a wet, dreary afternoon…there was no one in the place but themselves. Nellie shivered once in the chill air as she looked around, adjusting her hat and pulling the veil of black lace further down over her eyes.

"Come along, love," she said behind her, trying her hardest to sound warm and sturdy, and certain that she was failing.

It had been years since she'd visited this cemetery….and yet, she was amazed to discover that she hadn't forgotten the way at all. The moment they passed through the black iron gates, her feet seemed to move of their own accord along the same winding path she'd taken through the headstones on a bright, inhumanly cruel summer's afternoon, so very unlike this one….oh, so many years ago.

Sweeney's hand, which had until that moment been as still and limp as a dead fish, suddenly closed timidly around hers…she didn't look at him, but she squeezed his fingers as tightly as if she were afraid of losing him…which, in some sense…she probably was. Sweeney didn't utter a single word as they made their way among the empty tombstones, the hundreds of stone edifices of all sizes, jutting this way and that at irregular angles as the earth had moved and shifted over the decades and centuries. Angels and crossed seemed to be watching them from everywhere…eyes, stone and motionless, somehow seemed to be following them as they slowly wound their way towards the far corner of the graveyard. Nellie refused to let herself look back at him; she bit back so hard against the catch in her chest, it hurt the bottom of her throat.

The little grove of trees loomed before them…small, all of them, little more than saplings…and yet as they drew near, Nellie felt as if they were being swallowed up in an enormity of reaching, leafless limbs. The naked fledgling trees were allowed to grow up in this part of the cemetery….the grass, though pale and dead from the weeks of winter, was overgrown and unkempt. There was no markers here…no headstones, no fences, no angels. No ceremony. Just a wide berth of empty grass, populated by a sparse little alcove of dark wooded saplings….and there, not too far away from them, was an enormous, yawning chasm…a manmade gouge dug into the earth, surrounded by piles of black dirt, a single lonely shovel stuck upright near the edge, a sealed barrel of lime stationed faithfully at the corner. Three steps nearer would reveal the contents of that lonely hole…Nellie clenched her jaw and kept her face turned pointedly away from it. The only monument in sight was a single, chipping stone pedestal at the corner of the glen, on which were chiseled three green, lichen encrusted words.

_The Unknown Departed._

Nellie read the words silently in her head.

_Unknown departed. _

_Better known as the pauper's graves._

They came to a stop at the very edge of the square. Sweeney stood, silent and sleep-like beside her, their hands gently clasped. He said nothing. His face showed no more expression than the face of the stone beside them. He stared forward into the trees as if staring into another world.

Beneath their feet were the earth-eaten remains of hundreds upon hundreds of penniless dead…the endless supply of London's nameless, homeless, and impoverished. Grave markers were for the wealthy and well-connected. Unmarked trenches of mass burial were for everyone else. Beneath their feet, there rested the bleached skin, tattered rags, and crumbling bones of half a civilization.

Beneath their feet…somewhere….

…_._was Lucy Barker.

Nellie cleared her throat gently and looked down at her shoes. Sweeney's hand hung limply in her grasp and they stood at the edge of the pauper's graves.

"We came," she said quietly, her own voice sounding distant and far away, catching in her throat as she calmly spoke the horrible words she knew she had no choice but to say. "Albert an' I. An' little Johanna. She slept through the 'ole thing, of course, but we 'ad no place else to leave 'er. It was….it was a pretty day. Bright. I remember it."

She looked up, her eyes suddenly stinging. She sniffled and lifted a gloved hand to gesture weakly in the direction of the tree nearest to them…the smallest of the glade, an anemic, skinny little thing scarcely more than ten or eleven feet tall.

"It was there. At that one. I remember….'alfway 'tween those two pillars at the fence. It was…just a little thing, back then. Like…like a baby."

There was a moment of silence. She could hear the birds twittering in the branches.

Sweeney's hand slowly slipped out of hers. He walked forward onto the grass…she watched him from behind, a dark silhouette on the dark day, and he walked calmly and evenly toward the little tree. He came to a stop in front of. It looked down at the base of the trunk. His arms stayed still and motionless at his sides.

And for a long, long moment----how long, she didn't know…she would never know----they stood there in silence.

No…she didn't know how long she waited there at the edge of the grass, her hand clutched the neck of her coat and the pools of tears brimming like blurs of watercolor in her eyes, but refusing to fall. All she knew, was that the next time that Sweeney moved----she never took her eyes off of him, for a single instant----the clouds had begun to break, and the day's very first ray of pale, feeble sunlight cracked timidly through the sky. It shone down to earth in an arrow straight beam, landing somewhere far beyond the skyline of the city.

Sweeney looked over his shoulder at her. He didn't say anything….but she heard him, just the same.

Nellie swallowed, obediently crossing the grass and moving to stand beside him. They looked down together at the base of the tree. She glanced up at his profile. His brow was narrowed, his eyes hard and dark. He stared down at the ground, just as, so very long ago, he had once stared down into the fire of her parlor as she told him a story about a barber and his wife.

_A barber and his wife…._

Just as her eyes began to widen, he turned and looked at her.

Again…he didn't speak, and again…she heard exactly what he was saying to her.

Her mouth contorting, pressing into a line of impending sobs…but the tears never falling, not once….Nellie moved behind him, let her cane fall stiffly onto the grass, and wound her arms beneath his, and clasped them together at his front. She let her head fall to rest between his shoulder blades as she hugged him securely. He didn't move…he didn't so much as flinch. His cold, unfeeling eyes remained trained down at the unmarked grave, the grave that his Lucy…._oh, his Lucy…how she had once hated those words, how she had wept and cursed and cried under those words….but it was the truth, it would always be the truth…._the grave that _his Lucy _shared with a thousand other nameless beggars before her.

When Sweeney spoke, he was little more than whispering…but his voice rumbled, deep and everywhere, resonating beneath her ear. She closed her eyes and held him tighter.

"I…was sure…I would be angry."

She found the center of his chest with her palm and pressed her hand over his heartbeat.

"I was so sure, that when I…saw it…I would feel nothing but hate."

She cracked open her eyes, stifling a gasp, clearing her throat quietly instead.

"What…do you feel?" she whispered.

She felt, rather than saw, the thoughtful narrowing of his eyes.

"Tired."

She opened her eyes fully.

"I'm tired, Nellie. Tired of…hating…loathing…despairing. I'm just…so…tired."

It was brighter. Nellie looked up. A second ray of sunlight had pierced the cloud cover.

"Do you know, Nellie….somewhere in this cemetery….there will be a tomb for Judge Turpin. An empty tomb without a body. And I put him there. And…and…and here she is."

Sweeney's voice seemed to become thinner, emptier. He didn't waver…he didn't tremble. She felt no cries of despair inside him. He truly did just sound…_tired._

"I killed him, Nellie. I cut his throat with my own hands, just as I told myself I would. And…here she is…right here. It didn't make any difference at all." He head slowly lowered onto his breast, his face pointing straight down between his feet.

"It didn't make any difference at all."

Nellie squeezed him closer in her arms and heard herself say it before she knew she was even thinking it.

"I hated Lucy. For the longest time…I 'ated her more than I've ever 'ated anybody."

_I hated her._

The syllables hung in the air like smoke…Nellie stared at them in abject horror, and there was a single split second of the most indescribable panic she had ever felt…but it evaporated instantly when she felt Sweeney actually slacken further in his arms.

"I know you did," he answered quietly.

She squeezed her eyes shut. "You still love her….I know you do."

The most unexpected thing in the world.

He laughed.

Sweeney's back rose and fell, his shoulders shaking gently beneath her as he chuckled quietly for a few seconds. He lifted his face back up to the tree.

"I do."

He turned his head. He looked over his shoulder at her, and…_he was smiling. _A kind of smile that she had never seen before. She looked back up at him and sniffled, his face blurred in her vision…and yet still, the tears never fell.

"I suppose," she whispered, her voice trembling…she pressed her cheek again into his back, staring down at the dead grass, "I…suppose…I'm…a little glad of it."

"She liked you, Nellie. She did."

She closed her eyes. "And…I liked 'er, too, by the end. I really did. I tried to stop 'er, Mr. Todd, I tried…I wasn't fast enough, I…I _promise, _I _tried, Mr. T---"_

She felt herself slipping into the sudden grip of hysterical emotion, but before it could seize full hold of her, Sweeney had turned himself around in her arms and pulled her against his chest, holding her head with his hand and knocking her veiled hat off. It fell unnoticed to the ground and she hid her face in his coat without looking at it.

"I know you did," he whispered. "I know that."

She wanted to bury herself inside him. She folded her arms between their bodies and kept her eyes clamped shut in the blackness.

"Nellie."

She nodded without looking up.

"Thank you for bringing me here."

She nodded again.

"Don' mention it," she said, the words muffled into _"Dome memmon in" _in his chest.

"Nellie. There's something I want you to promise me you'll never let yourself think. Ever."

Slowly…she lifted her face. She stared, inches away, into the dark charcoal of his scarf. She kept her perpetually tear-filled eyes trained immovably on it.

"What's that," she breathed, her whole body trembling.

He leaned his face down and whispered near the crown of her head.

"Never…think….that I see her in you. Never think that."

She squeezed her eyes shut and her face twisted in a grinning sob. He lowered his face further until their foreheads touched.

"_Never…._think…that I love you…for _anything_…besides you."

Nellie opened her eyes, stepped back, and looked up at him. She couldn't help it. She smiled, sniffling.

"It's…it's a funny thing, Mr. T…for the longest time, I…for the _longest _time…I was sure you hated me."

His face was cold, hard, and uncaring. But his voice was a murmur of the deepest warmth she had ever felt from another human being.

"I did."

He lifted his hand and ran a tendril of her hair between his fingers.

"I hated you…because I liked you."

He buried his fingers in her hair, holding her head, looking down at her with an unflinching gaze.

"_Thank you………………………..love."_

A third ray of sun broke through the clouds. If Nellie didn't know better, she would say it was almost shining on the gate to the cemetery.

Before they left, Sweeney turned and walked a final time back to the tree at the head of Lucy's burial pit. He slipped something from his pocket, knelt down, and placed it at the base of the trunk. Without pausing, he turned around, walked back to her, picked up her hat, handed her her cane, took her arm in his, and together...they walked out of the graveyard. She, and him. Them...together.

_A barber and his wife._

Nellie turned her head to look back…just once…and just once…saw the flashing silver gleam of the razor…_the last razor…_.sitting at the bottom of the tree…shining, as it caught the streams of dancing sun.

They passed quickly through the market on their way back to the apartment. They bought a flute for Johanna, a brass compass for Anthony, and for Toby…they bought a dog. A man was selling mutt-terrier pups out of a crate on a street corner for a half-shilling each. Nellie picked him out…a comely little orange-furred runt with a ragged white patch over one eye. She thought his brown eyes had the same curious tilt to them that Toby's did every time he asked her a particularly thoughtful question.

They didn't buy a Christmas gift for Daniel. Every bob and trinket they considered giving to him always became ridiculous in the end….after all, what on earth could they possibly give him to even begin to repay everything he had done for _them? _Compared with that, a new teakettle or an untwisted bowler would be little better than an insult.

Nellie verbally bemoaned this decision later that evening when Daniel finally returned home. He, as it turned out, was the only among them who had _not _forgotten that it was Christmas, and had brought home a goose wrapped in red ribbon to surprise them for dinner.

A/N; There it is, y'all. Only one more chapter to go, if all goes as planned ( which I hope it does!!! ). Right now I'm way too wearied by this fic to really think about it, but maybe, just _maybe, _I see myself doing a couple of oneshot companions to this after its finished. That's if I live through the next couple weeks, of course. Who knows? Reviews make me smile. Oh, and ps, I apologize for any typos and slights in grammar. I was too dead from the neck up to properly proofread this at the time. Also, I openly admit that I have no idea what the exchange rate for nineteenth century British currency is, so I don't know what was considered a lot of money in those days...I actually did try to look it up, and got nowhere, so please forgive any apparent inaccuracies in that area.


	40. Chapter 40

A/N; Ok, I'll try to keep this as short and sweet as possible;

Has it been almost four months since my last update? Yes. Yes it has.

Do I apologize? Yes. Yes I do.

Do I have an excuse? No. No I do not. Once school was out for the summer, I pretty much went on complete fan fiction hiatus, and my only _possible_ excuse is that I was _unbelievably _burned out on this fic.

That being said….I _do _have a slight compensation for the ridiculously long wait, and here it is; this chapter is _60 word pages! 60!! _To put things in perspective, the average chapter of this fic is about 18-20 word pages, so this is pretty much the equivalent length of three chapters….I would have split it up, but for some OCD reason I had a weird urge to keep this story an even 40 chapters.

Also, a brief WARNING; as many of you may already have guessed, this chapter does, indeed, contain sex. The sex is by no means graphic or lemony ( I don't write lemons….never have, never will ) but yes, it is there. I did my best to keep everything within the T rating.

So there you have it. It's late, and it's long, and the majority of readers have probably forgotten about this story a long, long time ago…..but it's _done. _The story is really, finally, _done._

It was great while it lasted, and I sincerely hope you had as much fun reading as I had writing. Thank you, thank you, thank you to all my loyal reviewers, and if any of you are actually still around to read this last chapter….remember, reviews make me smile! ( and you're more than welcome to wail on me with literary baseball bats as punishment for taking so long with the update….but please, not in the face. )

Disclaimer; Forty chapters and untold hours of my life down the drain later…..and I still do not own, and never will own, Sweeney Todd. And I am as dirt poor as ever. ^_^

Enjoy, everyone!

Chapter 40

_Our Life, You and I_

With the first of January came a fierce, northern cold snap so atrociously bitter, it was feared for a short, anxious period in the early morning that no ships would be able to depart from the Thames that day. Fortunately, as hours passed and the dawn waned into early daylight, the sun struggled through forcefully enough that the boats---among them, the good vessel _Amnesty, _upon which the small, inconspicuous Copperwait family would be discretely vanishing forever---were clear to embark.

Sweeney felt as if he had been asleep---no, not asleep…_dreaming, _rather_---_for the past two weeks. Everything had passed in a surreal blur of indeterminable stillness, a melding of warmth and darkness….papers had been changed, post had been sent, suitcases packed, passports ordered, money arranged for, all in the blink of an eye, and now that there was nothing more to be done…here he stood. He looked out over the cold, ink-grey waters of the Thames, surging in choppy whitecaps beneath the clanking bridges and straight-backed waterfront buildings….his nostrils seared with the brown stink of the river, potent enough to water ones eyes, even in the dead of winter. He stood, on the high platform of the dock, everything he owned in the world packed into two suitcases at his feet. He looked out over it all….and he felt as if he were watching himself from another man's eyes. How could it be? How could that strange-looking man in the dark coat and hat, with the clean collar and gloves…with the pale, beautiful woman beside him, the eager young boy cradling a mutt whelp in his arms---the honest sailor, the noble constable, and the waif-like vision of gold in the dark green bonnet…all of them standing together at his side…

_How could that man be him?_

_How could it be that Sweeney Todd…he, Sweeney Todd…how could he have possibly._…_found a life again?_

The porters took up the last of their bags and began tossing them in an assembly line up the ramp. Other passengers were milling about here and there on the dock, tickets in hand, children gripped to their sides for dear life to keep them from wandering toward the perilous edge of the platform. From here, one could look out over almost half of London.

"Here, Mr….Copperwait…I thought these would be safest with you, personally," Daniel said quietly, holding out a broad, thick, envelope. Sweeney took it, astonished by its heavy weight. Daniel leaned toward him and whispered discretely.

"It's your paperwork. There are two copies of everything you'll need…identification, tickets, passports, everything….one set filed under each name. When you board, you'll be Mr. and Mrs. Nathaniel Copperwait…" he glanced briefly this way and that, then leaned closer, almost smiling as he whispered, "…and once you get off, you'll be Sweeney Todd and Eleanor Lovett again."

Sweeney accepted the papers, nodding once as he slipped them inside the breast of his waistcoat. He remembered, fleetingly, a small snatch of the conversation they'd had in Daniel's flat the day before.

"_But wouldn't it be….I don't know….__**safer**__, just to…?"_

"_No," Nellie had cut him off, staring straight into his eyes and raising her brows with an intimidating provocation of finality. Her brown orbs bored into his with iron clad determination, daring him to challenge her again. "I said __**no, **__and that's all there is to it."_

_Sweeney had glanced at Daniel, his jaw rolling in frustration. Daniel in turn looked back at Nellie._

"_It…ah…it might be a better idea, Mrs. Lovett, at least for the time being---"_

"_NO," she repeated firmly, crossing her arms and sitting up straight in the dining chair. "I won't do it. I've run from the law, I've run the Beadle, I've run from the 'ole bloody stinkin' world…I __**won't**__ spend the rest of my life runnin' from my own bloody name. I was born Eleanor, I've lived Eleanor, and I'm bloody fucking well getting __**married **__Eleanor!"_

'_Married' smacked against Sweeney's ears like the sharp crack of a palm, and he felt his face immediately begin to warm. He and Daniel shrank from her in unison, exchanging nervous glances. Sweeney fidgeted, clearing his throat and giving Daniel an awkward little nod that silently communicated, "For the love of God, just do what she says." Daniel hastily began leafing through the paperwork in front of him._

"_Well, then, I…I suppose…alright, Mrs. Lovett, if you insist. But you __**must **__remain Nathaniel and Emily Copperwait until the moment you've set foot on American soil."_

_Nellie nodded grimly, her eyes narrowing. Sweeney swallowed thickly as he watched her from the other side of the table, a small knot kinking in the pit of his stomach, realizing for the first time just how intimidating his bride-to-be could be when she really wanted. _

"Love."

Sweeney jumped, abruptly breaking from his reverie as he felt someone tug firmly at his shoulder. It was Nellie, her lips pressed in a firm line and her eyes set and hard.

"It's time, love," she said softly. "The ship's boarding."

Sweeney looked up. The ebbing slew of passengers were beginning to file up the boarding ramp in a snaking, continuous line, the porter checking their tickets one by one. The dock was already half empty, leaving the frigid nautical breeze ample freedom to bite and sting at their slowly chapping faces. Sweeney turned around---feeling suddenly very strange, and almost numb---to see Johanna, Daniel, and Anthony standing together side by side behind them. The young men kept their faces turned down as if to avoid making eye contact, Daniel turning his hat in his hands and Anthony looking very somber and uncomfortable…but Johanna's eyes were fixed on his, the pale grey orbs trembling with hidden moisture. She gazed straight at him, her lips parted as if she wanted to speak. In that split second, the reality of everything that had happened…and everything that was about to happen…struck Sweeney with full force, and the hollow space in his chest was filled up with warring swells of both excitement and sadness.

Nellie and Toby stood close on either side of him, the former holding his shoulder, the latter gingerly reaching for his arm. For a brief, unmoving moment, the six of them looked at each other in silence, and the small space between them already felt like a rift of immeasurable distance.

Daniel, per usual, was the first to regain himself. He looked up, a distinct bead of light shining in his hazel eyes as he stepped forward and slowly, almost timidly extended his hand. Sweeney looked at the outstretched appendage, then up into Daniel's quietly, sadly smiling face.

"It's been….a pleasure…Mr. Todd."

Sweeney's eyes narrowed, a strange---though becoming more familiar each time he felt it---lump of emotion caught in the bottom of his throat. He opened his mouth to speak, but found himself without words. _What were words, compared to everything Daniel had done for them? How could he possibly say it…possibly express it…_

He took the officer's hand in his, gently at first, then squeezing it tightly as they shook slowly up and down.

"Daniel," he muttered softly, his voice breaking and halting. "How…how, can we ever hope to…to _begin _to repay you?"

The young man only smiled and shook his head in reply. "Well, Mr. Todd, your little…mishap…it _did _cure me of my stutter, didn't it?" he grinned sheepishly, stifling a nervous chuckle at Sweeney's open-mouthed frown of protest. "I'll take that as payment enough."

Without giving the barber time to reply, he turned to Nellie, opening his mouth to speak---but before he could utter a single word she had let go of Sweeney's shoulder, stepped forward and taken him, calmly but firmly, in her arms. Daniel's eyes shot wide open, an instant flush of pink overtaking his face as Nellie hugged him fiercely around the shoulders, pulling him close against her. Sweeney, in spite of the heavy pall of sadness darkening their goodbyes, found himself struggling to suppress a snort of laughter at the suddenly flustered expression on the constable's face.

Nellie only squeezed him tighter, her head resting briefly on his shoulder, her eyes shut and her face grim with suppressed emotion.

"Thank you, Daniel," she was whispering, softly…so softly Sweeney didn't hear her so much as read the words on her lips. "Thank you."

Daniel's vaguely worrisome eyes met with his, as if silently asking his permission; Sweeney puckered his mouth absently, looking at the ground and pretending not to notice…but only when he offered a small, assuring nod did Daniel let himself put his arms around Nellie's shoulders, hugging her back…gingerly, uncertainly at first, then suddenly pulling her close with a directness the shy young man had yet to display in their presence. He closed his eyes and let his head tilt forward slightly, carefully avoiding the perilous ends of her feathered hat.

"No…I want to thank _you_, Mrs---"

Nellie cut him off, lifting her head to look him in the eye as a faint smile quirked her tired face.

"Oh, stuff up and don' ruin it, love," she muttered, grinning almost sadly. "A simple _you're welcome _would do jus' fine."

Daniel stopped, mouth open in surprise, only to melt into a shy smile and loosen his hold on her.

"You're welcome," he said quietly.

For a short, still moment of silence, they looked at each other. Sweeney watched them from the corner of his eye, feeling strangely that he ought to turn his back, yet wholly unwilling to do so. In that small space of silent contact between them, Sweeney all at once became aware of something that had in truth existed since the moment their lives became entwined with Daniel's, but that he had somehow not realized until that single instant. There was a _bond_…something unspoken that had formed between them during those black, desperate hours inside the Hall of Records…a deep, enigmatic kind of attachment that defied label or description, between this young officer and his wife-to-be. A bond that Sweeney knew, in the very pit of his consciousness, that he could never completely understand, or touch, or be any part of. It filled him with an interesting emotion that wasn't truly jealousy, but yet wasn't truly anything else, either. Perhaps if it had been anyone else beside Daniel---they owed him so much----but then….

Sweeney closed his eyes briefly and shook his head.

_Ahh…..never mind._

_Letting go of the old self and all that, I suppose….._

After almost half a minute of wordlessness, Daniel suddenly cleared his throat, releasing Nellie completely and fidgeting for a bit before awkwardly lifting one of her gloved hands in both of his. His voice was abruptly deep and serious, an invisible catch evident somewhere in the back of his throat.

"Well, I…suppose, this is…goodbye. Good…goodbye, then….Mrs. Copperwait."

Without breaking her gaze, without cracking his sudden expression of wistfulness, and without the slightest touch of suavity or debonair manners, Daniel clumsily lifted Nellie's hand and pressed his mouth to the rise of her knuckle. Nellie stood, frozen for a moment, her face hidden from Sweeney's peripheral gaze….and then, with marked silence, she rose up on her tiptoes and placed a chaste, surprise kiss---as light and swift as the landing feet of a butterfly---at the very corner of his mouth. She looked at his face a moment longer…then turned and moved back to stand at Sweeney's side.

The moment her lips grazed the officer's face, Sweeney felt an instantaneous flare of vicious heat, like a tongue of licking fire, swell up in his chest like a reflex. He bristled for an instant, bitten savagely by what he _knew _this time to be pure, seething jealousy and nothing else…but the next instant, reason returned to him and the fire swiftly died down. _No…no, he wouldn't give in to that impulse. That was the old Sweeney. The new man would learn to control those flares of temper. _Besides, it was _Daniel…_young_, _shy-faced, noble-as-a-sheepdog Daniel. He had about as much to be jealous of over their kisses as he did Nellie and Toby's.

After Nellie moved back to his side, Sweeney was only able to glance at her from the corner of his eyes, because he was far too busy keeping himself from laughing outright at the shade of red that had gone through the constable's face. It was only after a great deal of blinking and clearing his throat that Daniel at last found his voice long enough to squeak out, "I…er…I th-think we'll call our debt settled, now, Mr. Todd."

With a final nod, Daniel turned and busied himself handing their luggage over to the porters, who were now mingling here and there amongst the milling passengers, loading the last odd bags onto the _Amnesty _with indeterminable grunts and ape-like motions of their swinging arms. Sweeney smile was half-formed before he turned to Anthony and Johanna. The moment his gaze settled on them, it disappeared.

Johanna was staring down at the wooden planks of the dock. She had her fist closed over her mouth, her face frozen in a paroxysm of grief and listlessness. Her glassy grey eyes didn't blink, but they shone in the overcast light with glistening pinpoints of tears. Before Sweeney could speak to her, or even move his hand to reach out for her, he was suddenly accosted by a pair of thin arms seizing him about the torso and holding him in a stiff, grip-like hug.

Anthony's voice was thin and small beside his ear as Sweeney stood, half-statue with astonishment.

"I will miss you…my friend."

Sweeney blinked. His face changed. His eyes softened, a well of feeling growing in a place inside he was not yet accustomed to. He hesitated the barest space of an instant…then found himself closing his eyes and returning the embrace. He had never quite realized, before, just how wiry and lean the boy was…his shoulders felt like little more than the frame of a chair beneath his arms.

"Anthony," he heard himself whispering, quietly enough that only he could her beneath the ever-present rush of the waterside breeze.

The sailor's chin pressed into the shoulder of his coat. Sweeney's eyes squeezed tighter.

"_Take care of her, Anthony."_

The boy stiffened even further; when they moved apart, Sweeney felt an unpleasant jarring in his heart as Anthony quickly dashed at his eyes, immediately forcing a smile.

"I will, Mr. Todd."

Sweeney looked deep into the young, eager face…deep into the shining brown eyes…narrowed his brow, and uttered a single thought which, a moment after saying it, he realized was the complete and absolute truth.

"You're….like my son. You know that."

The smile vanished from the sailor's face, and the unshed tears shining his eyes ceased to be unshed. They stared at each other for what felt like a long moment, until Nellie mercifully sensed his desire and stepped in, pulling the young man away and immobilizing him with his back to Sweeney in a smothering hold.

"Come, Anthony, darling, an' give your Aunt Nellie a goodbye," she cooed soothingly, patting him on the back while simultaneously darting her eyes toward Johanna, then back at Sweeney.

"Last call for _Amnesty boarding!" _a haunting, voice chanted out somewhere nearby in a salty echo.

_Now! _Nellie mouthed silently.

Sweeney whirled to face her, but Johanna was already there…she was against him before he could take a breath. It was a single, flowing movement, a beautiful slowing down of time…like the clasp on a jewelry box sealing shut, his arms closed around her and sealed her against his heart, her tiny body seeming to disappear inside the unfastened wings of his coat. His eyes squeezed shut, moisture instantly threatening to bud from the corners; he pulled the bonnet down the back of her head to let his mouth and nose bury, just for a moment, in the soft crown of golden hair. He breathed deeply, his body shaking, his heart trembling; he held her so tightly he actually felt the small gasp of breath escape her as she sobbed silently. And he knew, with horrible suddenness and stillness, with an irrevocable finality…

_They had nothing else but this…this final moment together. _

_Nothing else but this._

Sweeney opened his eyes, the docks and the world and the future and the London skyline all dim and foggy before him, spread out like the reeling map of every day of his life that had been, and every day that was still to come. He looked down at his daughter…_his dove, his pet…his own flesh and blood…_

_His __**Johanna**__._

A single cold tear fell down his face. He closed his eyes again….and when he opened them, they were once again hard, dry, and dark….as black as the surging waters beneath them, and as sharp as the chill in the January wind.

_It doesn't matter who knows it, Johanna. It doesn't matter if you never decide to tell him. _

_It doesn't matter where we are._

_You'll be my daughter._

But all of it went unspoken. It passed between them in a silent understanding, a grim-faced acceptance of what had to be the truth. There was but one simple thing left to say, and Sweeney stared straight down at her and said it.

"I love you, Johanna."

She pulled her face from his chest, sniffed once, and clenched her jaw in a taut line, stepping back from him and smoothing the front of her dress. Her eyes were fixed downward as she answered, in a final gasp of emotion before again schooling her features into calm and quiet…

"I love you…father."

Anthony turned back that second, a sad, yet comforted expression on his face. He went and stood beside Johanna, linking his arm in hers and offering her a brave smile, which she returned with a weak, bleary-eyed glance of affection.

"Goodbye, lovely."

It was Nellie. Johanna's smile broadened and strengthened as the two women embraced, holding each other from the shoulders up for a generous moment.

"How can ever I thank you, Mrs. Lovett?" Johanna asked, sniffling as they parted.

Nellie only smiled, lifting a hand and holding the side of her face, just gently, for one passing second.

"Be happy, love," she said quietly. "Be young, and sweet…and be happy."

"_Amnesty! LAST CALL for boarding!"_

Sweeney felt Daniel's hand pulling at his shoulder. "I'm afraid you must go, Mr. Copperwait. They're drawing up the ramp."

Sweeney looked back at Anthony and Johanna….he looked at Nellie, and Toby, the poor boy, who'd been all but forgotten in the last few moments….

"AMNESTY! All passengers boarding the _Amnesty!"_

"_Mr. Todd!" _Daniel hissed urgently under his breath.

Nellie and Toby were moving away, heading toward the end of the swiftly dwindling line of other passengers. Nellie caught his gaze, her eyes wide and hurried. She gripped Toby's hand tightly in hers, signaling him to follow with the other.

Sweeney felt suddenly as if his feet had turned to lead. He couldn't walk. He blinked. _It was time. Time to go._

He looked back at Johanna, and her wide grey eyes…_Lucy's eyes…_filled his. He stared into them as he heard her small, politely informal voice.

"You'd better be along, Mr. Todd."

It echoed in his ears.

_You'd better be along, Mr. Todd._

He nodded calmly.

"Goodbye," he said simply, quietly….and with that…just with that….he turned his back on them and walked away.

"Safe journeys, my friend," Anthony's voice trailed after him. He lifted his hand over his shoulder in recognition, but didn't turn to look back. He kept walking…_marching, stolidly, as if the three people he was leaving behind on the dock were nothing more than strangers he'd met that morning while waiting for the ship_…until he met with Nellie and Toby. The three of them were the very last to board the ramp, the impatient, gruffly mutter porters tramping close on their heels.

_You'd better be along, Mr. Todd._

Sweeney stared forward into the back of Nellie's head---her pinned up curls and ridiculous feathery hat a veritable maze for the eye to lose itself in---wishing he could take her hand…he settled instead for laying his hand over Toby's shoulder as the boy stumbled hurriedly between them, struggling to cradle his squirming puppy with one arm.

There were…miraculously….no tears in his eyes as he moved up the ramp, as he inched along toward the deck of the ship that would bear him away from his only child, perhaps for the rest of his natural life.

_You'd better be along._

_Mr. Todd._

There were no tears…because he knew what she had _really_ said to him. What those words had really meant.

_Go. Go and live. _

_Father._

"Ouch! Watch your toes, dearie, you've almost pinned my 'em there."

"Sorry mum," Toby mumbled, staring carefully down at his feet. The wriggling puppy was repeatedly nibbling at his ear and bathing his temple with its tongue. Sweeney cracked a smile.

And it was then that fate decided to cast a final die in his direction. Not a large twist…not even a turn, really. Just one last little nod of interminable destiny before he would leave this place forever.

Sweeney happened to glance up to his right and look out over the freezing, churning waves of the Thames. He happened to notice that another ship, a much larger and more ominous-looking vessel, was also boarding just a short distance ahead of them, and that the line of passengers waiting to crawl up the ramp was so long it stretched all the way back to the dock of the _Amnesty. _As Sweeney absently followed the slowly moving queue with his eye, he realized with a jolting blink that they were not passengers at all. They were prisoners. _Exiles_. Dozens upon dozens of bitter, dark-eyed souls, each dressed either in grey, custom issue prison attire, or the tattered remains of the clothes they'd been arrested in….all of them manacled and shackled together, shuffling forward in a trudging stream of head-hanging finality. They were boarding a ship bound for the prison colonies in Australia. They were sheep being led to the slaughter_._

Sweeney felt a cold hand closing around his heart as the breath caught in his throat, as his eyes narrowed in a sudden swell of empathetic pain, looking down at the horde of condemned men. He could not help but wonder---as he strained to make out their eyes, their distant, downcast faces---he could not help but wonder….._how many of them were innocent? How many were innocent and would, because of __**this**__, be made guilty?_

_How many of those prisoners would be doomed to live a life…..just like his?_

But then, before he was able to complete the thought, something happened. Something that took place inside of a single second. Time froze, for one brief hiccupping instant, and Sweeney felt as if the world had stopped moving around him, stopped turning beneath his feet. His eyes didn't widen…they simply seemed to set inside his head, to become impossibly _still,_ staring with more calm and disbelief than he had ever felt simultaneously. His lips parted in abject wonderment.

He was staring at the second to last prisoner in the long line. The man was close enough to the edge of their dock that, squinting, Sweeney could make out the contour of his profile, the shape of his head, and the color of his thinning hair.

He knew that face. He knew that man.

_That man was Howard Connor._

But that…_that_, in itself….was not the die that fate threw at him.

The die that fate threw was the small stone---or the chink, or the crack, or whatever insignificant imperfection it was that disrupted the cobblestones beneath the prisoners' feet…or perhaps, in truth it was nothing more than the man's own fatigue---that made Howard Connor stumble and fall, face-first, sprawling on the cold ground and splashing the surface of a shallow puddle of brown water.

Being shackled to the man behind him, Connor unavoidably dragged his fellow prisoner down with him---there was a scuffling bout of cursing and obscenities accompanied with the angry, futile thrashing of limbs. The whole line of passengers had to be halted, and it took three constables to calm and hoist the fallen men back on their feet again. And in the midst of it, there was one single moment…_the moment that time stopped_…when Howard Connor was lying on his back on the ground, the constable's hands hooked beneath his arms, trying to drag him back to his feet….and in that moment, Connor looked up…

….and their eyes met.

Sweeney blinked as time slowed to a standstill.

Connor's eyes were like two pinpricks of steel in the distance, his face as small as a thumbprint in the annals of memory…and yet Sweeney saw him as clearly and sharply as if they'd been standing less than three feet apart.

He had never seen that expression on a man's face before. It was a kind of terror that he could not identify, that he could not understand---_he, _who believed he had seen every kind of terror a human was capable of feeling. No…this was the kind of terror a man exhibits when he legitimately believes that he has seen the face of the Devil. Connor was looking at him with just that breed of fear and horror, that exquisite revulsion so still and trembling one might almost mistake it for a passing tremor of amusement. Beneath that terror, the former Beadle's face was an almost unrecognizable abomination of what it had once been. The gaping cuts on either side of his mouth had been sewn shut, and improperly so, if the mottled color of chopped red and traces of infected, yellowed pus between the blood-soaked thread was any indication. His other features were mangled with jagged scabs and numerous bruises, and it appeared as if what little remained of his blonde mustache had been either shaved or torn out to better accommodate the medieval-looking stitches. But it wasn't only the disfigurement of the scars, the swelling, and the thread that rendered Connor's face into a corpse-like scab of its former self…it was something utterly deeper than that. It was the _lowness…_the plain, in-disguisable _lowness…._that face was the face of a man who had lost everything. _Everything…._more than his life, more than his pride….he had forgotten that he once had a life, he had lost even the mere _memory _of his pride.

Sweeney blinked again as he stared, and noticed suddenly that Connor's hands, unlike the other prisoners, had not been manacled. After another instant, he realized that this was because Connor had been supporting himself on a knobby, poorly hewn crutch…and this was because his right leg---the leg that Nellie had put a bullet into---had been amputated below the knee. The moment his eyes fixed on the pitiful, messily bound-up stump that had not so long ago been a functioning limb, Sweeney stopped dead in his tracks.

The world still seeming to move in slow motion, the porter behind him jerked to a halt, nearly banging face first into his back.

"'Ey, you, move it on there!"

Sweeney, of course, heard nothing. He stood like a statue in his frozen pocket of time, gaping down at the whimpering---_he somehow knew that Connor was whimpering, without having to hear it_---prostrate worm that it seemed had only yesterday been the symbol of all that was pain and torment in the world….and as he stared down at that pitiful thing, and it stared back up at him, the constable yanking mercilessly at its arms, its eyes a widened shade of frightened gray fit to match its shabby prison-issued clothing….as the porter behind him complained, as Nellie and Toby stopped to turn and look at him, their mouths moving soundlessly in his suddenly deafened ears…..Sweeney Todd made a discovery.

_He felt sorry for Howard Connor._

The instant that thought pondered slowly across his mind, fate snapped its fingers and time started again.

"Git a move on, yeh blimey twit!"

The blunt shove of the porter's palm on his back sent Sweeney stumbling forward up the gangplank, just stopping himself from tripping into Toby.

"Come along, love, we 'aven't time!" Nellie pleaded gently, shooting him a pursed-lip look. She and Toby linked hands again and hurried up the last few feet to the deck of the _Amnesty, _where a man in uniform was waiting to collect tickets.

Her eyes flashed in his…her voice tingled in his ears. _Come along, love, we 'aven't time!_

Sweeney didn't look back again. He reached the top of the ramp, pulled the small paper shapes of their tickets from inside his jacket, and surrendered them to the waiting steward. The still-grumbling porter stepped up after him; the plank was drawn away, the gate shut, and somewhere above them a bell began to ring, accompanied with the shouting of many deckhands. The open deck of the _Amnesty _was chattering with wandering passengers, lingering about the side rails and waving to their families and well-wishers left behind down on the dock. Sweeney looked about him in the pond of heads for a dazed moment before he felt the pull of a small hand on his and looked down.

"This way, Dad," Toby instructed him, guiding him through the milling people toward a spot near the railing where Nellie stood. The moment she caught sight of him she heaved a heavy exhale, seizing him by the scruff of his clothes and pulled him toward her.

"'Eaven's _sake, _Mr. T, can' I take my eye off you for a _moment?" _she griped, pressing her lips firmly, but sounding more relieved than annoyed. When he didn't respond, even that small trace of sternness disappeared, and she narrowed his eyes at him in concern. "What's the matter? Why'd you stop?"

Sweeney looked back in the direction of the exiles' ship, blinking as if looking back on a dream; but the line of prisoners had shrunk far enough away that he couldn't make out any of them individually. He couldn't even see if any of them were limping on a crutch.

_Was it possible….could he have imagined it?_

His heart pounded anxiously…his eyes scanned back and forth along the Thames wall….

….and then, he felt Nellie's hand lay gently on his chest. He turned and looked at her…looked deep into her warm, worrying brown eyes…saw the little lights, like stars, shining back at him…and just like that, it didn't matter. It didn't matter one bit.

"Nothing," he said softly, lifting his hand and holding it, just briefly, over hers. "Nothing."

And in the space it took him to mutter that small word, it became the truth. He turned to Nellie…smiled at her, faintly….and in that instant, he forgot about Howard Connor forever.

Nellie watched him concernedly for a second longer, but quickly turned her head to gaze down at the dock below when Toby's little voice piped up excitedly.

"Mum, Dad, look! There's Daniel and the others!"

Sweeney peered down over the ship's railing, and sure enough, there they were…Daniel, Anthony and Johanna, standing together at the back of the dock and waving to them in somber, sadly smiling farewell. Slowly, gingerly…the three of them raised their hands and waved back.

_Goodbye…Anthony…Daniel…._

…._Johanna…._

…_**Lucy.**_

_Goodbye, Lucy._

The great wooden body of the _Amnesty _lurched beneath their feet…sailors shouted orders to each other from the top deck and the riggings…the clanging bell stopped its clanging. The dock and the smiling, waving faces began to glide slowly and smoothly past them to their right, the great skyline of London trolling by at an even slower pace. The nose of the ship turned into open water…the sails were unfurled, the ropes slid loose, and within five minutes they were so far from the bank of the river that the people walking along its dike looked like dark little insects crawling on the brick.

The dark, stinking waters of the Thames surrounded them on all sides, and the whole of London rolled out past the broadsides of the ship like pictures in a storybook. Sweeney slipped one arm around Nellie's waist and pulled her a bit closer to him as they watched the filthy, soot-covered buildings go scrolling by. Not too far away, the stiff, regal spire of Big Ben loomed over the city and echoed forth eight haunting chimes…._eight o'clock. _By nine o'clock, not even the smallest bit of London would be visible to them.

Stewards and cabin boys were making their way around the deck, rounding up the passengers to be taken down below to their cabins. Sweeney tightened his arm around Nellie's waist and looked back out at the gradually shrinking city horizon. They were nearing the first bridge now…he could hear the cumbersome churning and clanking of the gears as the draw was raised to allow passage of the mast and sails. He looked down to his right and, in spite of himself, felt the smile tugging again when he saw Toby wrestling with the impatient whelp.

"Thought of a name?" he muttered gruffly, one corner of his mouth quirking upward.

Giving up at last, Toby let the wriggling ball of nappy orange fur slip down onto the deck, wrapping its cord leash twice around his knuckles. The dog yelped shrilly and turned in circles, quickly settling down to gnaw at the ankle of Toby's shoe. The boy smiled, looking up at Sweeney.

"I was thinkin' about 'Pie'….on account o' the patch round 'is eye sort o' makes 'im look a bit like a little piebald, don' you think?"

Sweeney's smile froze. Without thinking he jerked his gaze up to Nellie's face. She was staring back at him with an open-mouthed dead-pan. After a few seconds, she worked her jaw soundlessly and cleared her throat.

"That…sounds….lovely, dear," she gritted, coughing once and turning her head. Sweeney's smile flattened into a straight line as lifted his hand to rest at the nape of her neck.

"Toby," he said gently. "Why don't you take Pie and see if one of the hands will show you down to our cabin?"

The boy, though looking slightly puzzled, nodded and moved obediently off, timidly pulling the uncooperative puppy behind him. As soon as he was gone, Nellie lifted her hand to her eyes and bowed her head, sighing heavily.

"'E would, wouldn' 'e? Of all the…_ruddy, blazin…."_

"Shhh," Sweeney whispered. "He doesn't know."

"I _know _'e doesn' know, don' you _see? _That's the worst of it! God in 'eaven, I swear to bloody _Jesus _I'll never make another pie as long as I---"

"Nellie," he cut her off, looking her squarely in the eye. She looked back at him, clearly wanting to say more, but biting her tongue with a glint of watery shine to her eyes. Sweeney felt a sharp twinge go through his chest. He lifted his other hand and passed his finger softly beneath each eye.

"Nellie," he muttered quietly. "Let's you and I go down too."

The shimmer still there, she sniffed once and straightened the neck of her dress, gently indicating her head back in the direction of the city, now little more than a broken black line as the _Amnesty _moved out into open waters. "You're sure? You don' want to…to watch it shrink away? It was our 'ome, after all."

Sweeney shook his head. He didn't need to look up. He didn't need to look back.

_You'd better be along, Mr. Todd._

"No," he answered softly, leaning forward and brushing his lips ever so faintly along her cheek. "No. Let's go down, Nellie. Let's go down and never look back at it again."

Her eyes delved deep into his---_deep….searching---_and after a moment of stillness, she sniffled and nodded.

"You're right. Let's go."

Without another word, the two of them turned away from the rail and went, arm in arm, to the doors leading down to the lower deck, where a crowd of passengers had already gathered and was waiting to enter. London disappeared behind their backs, and was gone….forever.

As they were passing through on their way to the staircase, an elderly, extremely well-dressed woman of obvious high social rank behind them in line turned to her husband---as she held a delicate, embroidered handkerchief to her chin with one silk-gloved hand---and said, in a warbling voice too loud to not be overheard;

"Oh, but I _shall _pine for home while we're away, shan't you, Edgar? _Oh, _how my heart aches to think of parting so long with my dear London!" she sniffed into the hankie. "God save the Queen!"

A faint, amused murmur of consent flitted through the other nearby passengers.

"Well said, Madam!"

"For the crown!"

"For England!"

"God save the Queen!"

"'_Ere, 'ere!" _a sudden, sardonic noise like a rooster crowing quickly silenced the murmurs.

Nellie's crass, Cockney squawk broke through the patriotic chorus like a rock plunked down among glass beads. Sweeney jerked his head to look at her in surprise, as did everyone standing immediately near them.

With every eye watching her in astonishment, Nellie suddenly sniffed, tilted her head back, snorted sharply in the back of her throat, turned, hocked, and spat soundly on the deck. Sweeney jumped, staring at her with his jaw dropping.

"May God save the ol' shit'ole!" she muttered proudly, craning her neck and saluting the fading shoreline with one hand before turning back to hike up her skirts and descend the staircase with unceremoniously clunking footsteps.

Cries of indignation circled around them, and the distinguished older woman's face twisted in horror. She lifted her hand to her mouth and uttered an appalled, fluttering gasp, followed by mortified cry of disgust which she made no effort to contain.

"Good…sweet…_heavens! _Such _language! _And from a _lady!"_

She feigned a brief swoon, dropped her handkerchief, and had to be helped down the stairs by her red-faced husband on one side and a charitable stranger on the other.

Sweeney was still laughing when they reached the door to their cabin almost seven minutes later.

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

It had been a pleasantly dull morning for Pastor Wallace Hammond.

The weather, which by all indications of the previous week ought to have been wet and miserable, had taken a most unpredicted turn for the better that cool, bright morning of March the third. While it was, admittedly, still rather cold and sharp outside, with ample traces of the February snows still lingering on the ground, the mottling of grey clouds that had darkened the sky almost since last Sunday had finally decided to clear, revealing an enormous, cobalt sky as crisp and beautiful as ironed linen, the sun beaming down in floods of yellow light and making even the muddy, mired roads of the Norfolk market seem fresh and alive.

As a result of the enjoyable weather, Hammond had supposed that the service would be exponentially more crowded than usual…and again, expectations went unmet. The pews were markedly quiet and lonely that Sunday of March the third; scarcely two dozen members of the Parish had seen fit to attend service. Hammond weathered the poor turnout as he weathered everything; with calm quiet and a weary, crow-footed smile. He had stood at the door until the last visitor had gone, shaken any hand had to be shook, proffered many a polite smile, and now that the church bells concluding the service had been officially rung---their echo having scarcely yet faded from the steeple rooftops of the little town square---Pastor Hammond breathed a tired sigh of relief and immediately retreated to his office behind the sanctuary, looking greatly forward to a late morning of peaceful reflection. There, after removing his shawl, shoes, and vestments with a brief fold of his hands and a nod heavenward, he gratefully sat down to the cup of tea laid out for him by Mrs. Mackenzie and reclined in his chair, gazing contentedly out the window at the passing carriages.

Pastor Hammond had always enjoyed relaxing in his office after service; from his single modest window, he had quite an agreeable view of the harbor. He could watch the tall ships coming and going, and occasionally he might catch a glimpse of the passengers filing down boarding ramps. Even now as he sat there, reclined in his chair with the teacup positioned comfortably over his stomach, Hammond could make out the stern of a large ship just as it left port. It was flying the British colors from its rear mast.

Yes…it had been a pleasantly dull morning for Pastor Wallace Hammond.

Dull, that was….until he heard the sharp sound of Mrs. Mackenzie's wizened old knuckles rapping hurriedly on his office door.

Hammond started at the abrupt noise, slipping forward in his chair and almost upsetting the teacup. He coughed once, straightening up and clearing his throat as he lifted his spectacles from the thin chain around his neck and held them to the bridge of his nose.

He cleared his throat once more. "Yes? Come in, Mrs. Mackenzie."

The tight white bun, pointed jaw, and bright little eyes of the elderly lady popped timidly through the doorway.

"Excuse me, Pastor, I know you've just sat down, but there are some…er…folks, here, to see you."

Hammond blinked, raising the spectacles higher. "'Folks?'"

"That is…er….strangers, sir."

Hammond smiled wearily, raising an eyebrow. "Now, Mrs. Mackenzie, _strangers? _Surely you know that there are no _strangers _to the house of our Lord."

Mrs. Mackenzie's eyes widened into a strange expression as she shook her head back and forth. "Ohhh, no, Pastor, I'm _quite _sure….if ever I did see _strangers _in my life_, _sir,these folks'd fit the bill. Perhaps you'd best come and see for yourself. They've asked to have a moment with you."

Pastor Hammond sighed, stepping into his shoes and straightening his vest and collar as he stood up.

"Tell them I'll be out in a minute, Mrs. Mackenzie," he murmured, reaching for his robe. He looked up quickly as the door was closing. "Oh…Mrs. Mackenzie?"

The wiry little woman paused. "Yes?"

"I take it, then, that they're not members of the congregation?"

Mrs. Mackenzie puckered her wrinkled mouth into a sharp whistle. "Ohhhh, no no no, Pastor, I shouldn't say so. They're foreigners, sir, claim to have just stepped off the boat."

Hammond's eyebrows raised. _The boat? Surely not…?_

"Oh…I…I see. Well…er…I'll just be a moment. Thank you Mrs. Mackenzie."

_The boat? _he thought, slipping his arms into the billowing sleeves of his robe and smoothing down the front of it with his hands. _Now, wouldn't that just beat all?_

The late morning sun was streaming brightly through the stained glass windows of the little church as Pastor Hammond stepped through the doorway and into the sanctuary, his jaw firm and his eyes wide and alert. His steps echoed in the large empty room and he made his way down the aisle.

He made it halfway through the pews….then stopped. He managed to keep his mouth closed…but only just. Pastor Hammond blinked in curious astonishment as he stared at them…his dull, pleasant morning had quite abruptly become far less dull. In fact, he didn't think he'd ever laid eyes on a queerer little bunch in all his fifty-eight years.

The 'foreigners,' as Mrs. Mackenzie called them---and rightly so, judging by the snippets of conversation he couldn't help but overhear echoing through the sanctuary…from the sound of the woman's harsh Cockney tilt, as well as the heaps of luggage resting at their feet, he'd say they had indeed just stepped off the ship flying British colors---were standing together at the back of the church, huddled just inside the closed doors. There were three of them; a man, a woman, and a young boy that Pastor Hammond supposed must have been their son. While he knew it was rude to stare, he found himself unable to keep from gaping at the small party for at least a brief moment before moving forward.

Yes, he was certain of it now…_never _had he seen a stranger-looking set of folks. For starters, all three of them were positively pale as ghosts. The boy perhaps wasn't _quite_ as sallow-looking, but the woman and the man…good gracious, they were downright _corpse-_like! His eyes fixed first on the woman, who was facing the other two, busying herself trying to fix the man's rumpled collar and muttering not quite under her breath---something about pie, what on earth?…Hammond then noticed the little orange dog curled up in the boy's arms…perhaps that was it? Either way, he blinked twice as he looked at her, lifting a hand to adjust his spectacles. Even from a distance it was plain that she wasn't entirely unattractive…in truth, far from it…her face had a pretty, heart-shaped little turn to it that was almost lovely, from the right angle…no, what truly astounded him was that…that…._thing, _perched atop her head! Now, Pastor Hammond was no stranger to the ridiculous trends of ladies' hats these days---he'd seen more than his share of flowery, crepe-papered concoctions peering at him from the rows of his congregation on warm Sundays---but never, _never _had he seen anything like the macabre configuration of what looked like navy-blue paper flowers stuffed in the orifices of an entire taxidermy raven, with its wings spread for flight and its glass eyes shining white in the streaming sun. It was hunkered in a nest of beads, more rumpled flowers, and turkey feathers, and the whole monstrosity was pinned meticulously over a head of wildly frizzy auburn red curls. The pale creature's dress was every bit as bizarre as her hat; an enormous skirt of navy and white, trimmed with black lace, and a scoop-necked striped corset that cinched her waist practically to the size of a horse-shoe. Pastor Hammond cleared his throat and pointedly avoided looking at the lady's rather…._ample, _figure from the waist up, made only more prominent by the propping design of the dress and immodest plunge of the neckline. And to cap it all off, she was leaning heavily on a dark-wooded cane.

But where the pale woman intrigued and bemused him, the pale _man _standing beside her---_her husband, presumably?---_veritably sent shivers down Pastor's Hammond's spine. Dressed in black and charcoal from head to toe---save the blunt white of his ruffled collar and cuffs---the man cut an ominous figure, to say the least. He was grim-faced and silent, looking more tired than anything, and he was continuously rubbing his face with his hand as he patiently withstood the chattering woman's fussing with his tie and shirtfront. The dark, sunken circles beneath his eyes were enough to make anyone uneasy…but his _hair…_a wild mane of jet black, with a single shock of lightning white streaking through it from the crown…Pastor Hammond merely shook his head in fascination. _Mrs. Mackenzie certainly wasn't exaggerating! _They looked like they might be characters uprooted from a Gothic novel.

Then suddenly, without warning, the stuffed raven jolted upward, and Pastor Hammond was pinned with the piercing gaze of the woman…her eyes widened, her thick, plum-colored lips parted in an instant of surprise, then spread into a warm smile. Hammond jumped, coughing quickly, and hurriedly regained himself as he continued to walk down the aisle toward the odd-looking little family waiting at its end.

Both the man and the young boy stood still as statues, staring wordlessly at the Pastor with blank, wide-eyed expressions. The woman, contrastingly, beamed like an alabaster sunflower and even dipped an almost intangible curtsy as Hammond drew near to them.

"Pleasure to make your acquaintance, Father, I'm sure," she grinned, her crass accent cutting the air between them.

Pastor Hammond smiled stiffly, waving his hand politely. "Oh, ah…there's no need, to….it's…er….it's Pastor, actually, Pastor Wallace Hammond."

The woman paused a moment, then snorted with a short burst of laughter. "Ha! Well 'ow about it, I 'spose it's been longer n' I thought! Beggin your pardon, sir, not much of a reg'lar myself, I'm 'fraid," she chortled. "Bit relieved, though, to tell you the truth…yours 'as the on'y church we spotted, so o' course I'd not 'ave objected either way, but…always been a bit off the Catholics, you see, e'er since my poor knees gone South. Can't tolerate the exercise, all that dodgy up an' down an' whatnot in the service…s'nough to wear a body straight out! No offense, o' course."

Hammond blinked, his smile crinkling. It was quite impressive, truthfully, how much speech the woman was able to fit into a single breath.

"Ah….none taken, ma'am." He cast a wary glance toward the man, who had yet to speak and was staring quite rigidly down at the floor. For a moment the Pastor thought he spied a faint trace of blush marking his pale face, but the woman's bubbly voice called his attention back before he could be certain.

"But listen to me, jabberin' on when we've so little time!…..Straight to the point, sir, we're 'ere to tie it on."

Pastor Hammond blinked. His smile wavered, his brow knitting.

"Ex…cuse me?"

"Tie it on," she repeated, pausing at the Pastor's blank stare. "You know, 'itched? 'Orse an' wagon, ball an' chain?"

A second blink. "I…I'm afraid I don't understand."

The woman sighed, rolling her eyes and pursing her lips impatiently. "_Married?"_

The Pastor's mouth opened wide, suspended for a moment in realization.

"Married….oh! I…I beg your pardon, ma'am," he stammered, chuckling nervously. "I apologize, for a moment I wasn't su---"

"Quite alrigh', quite alrigh'," the woman cut him off impatiently. "But _please, _sir, we're in a terrible 'urry. We've a very important meeting in less than an 'our, an' I don' know _what _we'll do if we can't find the right street in time---"

"Wait, wait," Pastor Hammond raised his hands to stop her, squinting incredulously through his spectacles. "Are…are you saying…you want to get married, _right this very minute?"_

The woman uttered an exasperated groan. _"Yes, _'aven't you been listenin' to a word I've said!? It won' take a moment, we don' need nothing' fancy! Jus' the words an' a few scribbles on the certificate, and we'll be out of your 'air faster 'an flies off vinegar!"

The Pastor's mouth worked soundlessly for a moment. "But I…I don't…I've never….who _are _you??"

Having only expected the strange woman's impatience to compound at the question, Hammond was surprised when a blank look stole over her face, quickly followed by an apologetic smile.

"Oh, I _do _beg your pardon, sir…where are my manners? Name's Eleanor, Eleanor Lovett. Gentleman 'ere is Mr. Sweeney Todd, and the little fellow's our lad Toby."

_Eleanor Lovett….and Sweeney…Todd? And their…lad?_

All at once, the situation became patently obvious. Pastor Hammond's smile flickered, straightening into a tight line, and he almost sighed. _Of course….he might have known. Unmarried lovers…a child out of wedlock…he'd seen it too many times before. _

"A…pleasure, Ms. Lovett," he replied in a faintly stiff, though sympathetic voice. "And…Mr. Todd," he added, turning to look at the man and waiting expectantly for him to speak…but the wild-haired stranger---this Sweeney Todd, as it were---said nothing. He simply stood there, eyes turned to the side of the woman's head, his brow knit in a painful expression of what seemed to be either abject mortification, or a mild stomach pain…or both. The small boy, still holding the orange puppy in his arms, was darting his gaze back and forth between the Pastor and his mother, his youthful eyes bright with curiosity.

"Well?" Eleanor Lovett said blankly, after another moment of poignant silence. "'Ow's it done, then? Shouldn' we move to the altar? I 'spose you'll 'ave a fixed rate for this sort o' thing…Toby, love, d'you see my purse there…?"

Hammond hastily interrupted. "Ah….I'm afraid I cannot simply…er…._marry _you, right on the spot, this way, ma'am."

Lovett paused, the corners of her mouth dropping and her eyes wide and innocent. She straightened up, regarding him with a look that for some reason stood the hairs of his neck on end.

"Oh?" she said, in a voice that was altogether much too calm. It hinted of danger. "An' why's that?"

His resolve melting, the Pastor wet his lips anxiously and looked again to Mr. Todd, who was at last meeting his gaze, but was now wearing an expression that teetered on the verge of fear. The pale-faced man began making sharp, jerky motions with his eyes, trying desperately to silently communicate something. Narrowing his eyes at him confusedly, Hammond stumblingly tried to explain.

"Well…er…it's just…I'm afraid it's not quite so simple a thing, ma'am" he said, glancing out the corner of his eye every few seconds at Mr. Todd, who had now added head and hand motions to silent urging; "We only marry members of our own congregation here, you see, and only with due notice beforehand. Now, if you and your…er…._betrothed…._would care to return after services next week, we would be more than happy to enroll you in confirmation cla---"

_Thunk._

Pastor Hammond jumped, his voice breaking off abruptly at the heavy thud, which he realized was caused by Ms. Lovett knocking over a suitcase with her foot as she took a single, menacing step toward him. The curious innocence was gone from her face, her eyes now drilling into his with a terrifying, half-lidded stare of intimidation.

"Oh, now, Mr. 'Ammond sir…." her voice was frighteningly low and calm, "…_surely_ you'd be willin' to make an exception, this _once?_"

Hammond swallowed dryly. "I'm…I'm _sorry, _Ms. Lovett, but I'm afraid I simply can't---"

"Nellie."

Hammond's voice stopped in his throat. He turned to look at Mr. Todd, the firmness of the man's voice immediately silencing him. Ms. Lovett turned to face him as well, her cold stare softening lightly.

Taking his first steps since entering the church, Mr. Todd quickly moved to interject himself between Lovett and the Pastor, taking her shoulders in his hands and looking her straight in the face. Pastor Hammond backed away slightly, greatly relieved that something now stood between he and the woman. Todd began speaking to her in close, quiet tones, his body almost obscuring her from Hammond's view. The Pastor craned his neck slight, his ears perked with cautious curiosity at the hushed voices.

"Nellie…are you sure you want it this way?" he said, his words barely audible.

The woman had her arms folded. They slowly dropped to her sides as the sharpness in her eyes was gradually fading. She nodded firmly.

"I'm sure."

"We…we _could _wait, Nellie. We could go and meet Fitzwilliam today, and get settled in the house first. We could wait and have a real wedding…a _real_ wedding, with flowers, and a gown, and...and our own rings….a wedding by the sea, just like you've always wanted. That…is, what you always wanted…isn't it?"

There was a brief moment of silence. Lovett eyes wavered at him, as if searching his face---Hammond leaned further to the side, trying to catch a glimpse of Todd's expression, and gave a small start of alarm when he saw how close their faces had drawn together, and heard Ms. Lovett's soft, deep-throated whisper as her eyelids hovered dangerously.

"It…was, what I always wanted."

She lifted her gloved hand and touched it lightly to Mr. Todd's chest. Hammond opened his mouth to protest, but was stricken speechless with embarrassment.

"But not anymore, love. I understand now. It's not the weddin' that's important. We could 'ave the weddin' in a bloody sewer and it wouldn' make one bit of difference."

The puppy in the little boy's arms squirmed and whined with complaint. The Pastor felt himself on the verge of making a similar noise.

"It's not the wedding, Sweeney….it's you. Only you. You and I…that's all we need."

Then her voice fell away, and there was a moment of still, marked silence, during which Pastor Hammond became fearfully convinced that the two of them were about to burst into shameless lavishes of carnal affection right there in the sanctuary…but just when it seemed their faces were about to meet, the man quickly pulled back and pointed his face down, holding her at arms length.

"Alright," he whispered, after a long moment.

Pastor Hammond nearly jumped out of his shoes when Mr. Todd abruptly turned and pinned him with a pair of staring black eyes, as sharp as polished coal even as they brimmed over with pleading desperation.

"Pastor Hammond," he said quietly, closing his hands in front of him, "I beg you to reconsider."

Hammond shook himself slightly and regained his composure.

"I'm _sorry, _Mr. Todd, truly I am, but---"

"Sir," Todd cut him off, his eyes boring straight into his. "Please_."_

"But---"

"_Please."_

Hammond stammered into silence, the words suddenly failing him. Those _eyes…._those dark, biting, supplicating eyes!….he couldn't look away from them. He squinted uncomfortable under their penetrating cry, their lights almost an audible sound in his ears….

Mr. Todd's brow narrowed, his jaw tightening.

"Pastor Hammond….._please."_

Hammond felt a sharp pang of pity cinching in his chest. Those eyes….they _were _saying something to him. They were speaking so clearly, they might have been a human voice…or perhaps, the voice of some third party….the intervention of a divine entity. Hammond gently pressed him mouth into a line as the words resonated within him.

_You have no idea….__**no, idea**__….what this man has been through._

_Let him have this._

The Pastor heard himself speaking before he had consciously made up his mind.

"Alright," he said softly.

Hammond could have sworn he felt the approving touch of a higher power when this stranger, this Mr. Todd, smiled at him.

It was, without question, the plainest---and fastest---wedding Wallace Hammond had ever conducted. There was no music. There were no flowers. There were no readings, and there was no family. There was only a single witness….two, perhaps, if he counted the dog. As for rings, it wasn't until the three of them were in place at the altar that Hammond realized the man and woman were already wearing them, and that they weren't even a matching pair; the woman's was a thin band of pewter and the man's was heavy and brass. He was about to open his mouth to say something, but quickly thought better of it.

Hammond forewent the lengthy liturgy and read only the barest requirements of the holy text---it took less than two minutes. Eleanor Lovett and Sweeney Todd stood in front of him, side by side before the raised platform of the altar, dressed in ordinary clothes, without so much as a wedding bouquet between them. When he asked Eleanor if she wouldn't like a white veil, she had looked at him for a cross instant, then simply laughed and waved the question away with a blunt,

"Ha! As if I'd pretend to be a _virgin!"_

A plain affair it was, indeed.

"Sweeney Todd. Do you take this woman to be your wife?"

There was no hesitation, no warm, smiling glances at his lover. Todd stared forward at the Pastor with a face as blank as stone and answered in the blandest of monotones,

"I do."

"Eleanor Lovett. Do you take this man to be your husband?"

She smiled faintly, and answered in a calm and practical voice, "I do."

Pastor Hammond wrinkled his wizened crow's feet and closed the Bible.

"I now pronounce you man and wife. You may kiss the bride."

And there, for the first and only time in the entirety of the economized little ceremony, was there a halting pause. Mr. and Mrs. Sweeney Todd turned to face each other, and for a single instant suspended in time, neither of them moved. Neither of them were smiling. They stood, backs straight and eyes dim, and looked at each other with matching expressions that Hammond could not describe or identify. But the moment passed. It was Mr. Todd who started time moving again. He closed his eyes, bent forward at the waist, and kissed his bride full on the mouth with his arms held down stiffly at his sides. They hung there, together---their lips the only point of contact at the strange angle---for a few seconds of utter silence, locked inside their own world.

And then, as quickly as it had started…it was over. Man and wife separated, looked at each other again, and then, without another instant of hesitation, turned and began marching down the aisle back toward their luggage. _Tap, clunk, tap, clunk, tap, clunk…._it was astonishing how quickly the woman could move while half-gimping on her cane. Their son hurried after them, his face split with a wide grin and his little dog yapping and trailing at his feet.

Pastor Hammond stood stricken for a moment on the altar, watching them go. Just as they were lifting up their suitcases he found his voice and called after them.

"Wa…..wait! I haven't written you the marriage certificate yet!"

"I'm sorry, we've no time!" called Eleanor from the opposite end of the church, her voice echoing off the cavernous walls. "If we don' leave this moment, we'll miss our appointment!"

"Oh….oh," Hammond said quietly, lowering his hand.

"Don' fret dearie, we'll be back to fetch it the moment we're settled!"

"Ah…al…alright, Ms….er….Mrs….Todd….I'll just, ah…I'll just write that up for you?"

"We'd be much obliged. Thank you, Mr. 'Ammond, thank you so very much, for everythin'!"

Todd was already opening the doors, and the boy with his dog had already scurried out into the churchyard.

"You're….welcome," Hammond called back, his brows raising. He caught one final glimpse of Mr. Todd's face, smiling back at him as he stood outside the double doors, his wild mane of hair lit for an instant like a bizarre halo in the golden midday sun….and then, the doors clasped loudly shut, and the beam of light snipped off cleanly into calm, silent shadow once more.

Pastor Wallace Hammond stood, alone and dazed, blinking on the altar of the empty sanctuary. For a long, quiet space, he remained there, staring blankly at the spot where the Todd family had stood moments ago.

Perhaps he had imagined the whole thing.

"Pastor?"

Hammond jumped and turned to see Mrs. Mackenzie sticking her head around the corner at the hallway leading to his office. Her face was pinched with curiosity.

"Pastor, what did they want? Who were they?"

He paused, glanced back at the door, then back at Mrs. Mackenzie.

"Newlyweds," he answered plainly.

The wrinkled lady blinked. "Newlyweds?"

Hammond nodded once, slowly. "Newlyweds. Mrs. Mackenzie, would you be a saint and please brew me a fresh cup of tea? I have a few….things….to write out, in my office."

On his way back to the sunny little room with the view of the harbor, the Pastor glanced over his shoulder a final time to look at the closed doors….then shook his head slowly, adjusting his spectacles as he walked calmly back to his office.

_No idea…_

…_.no idea._

"No strangers in the house of our Lord," he reminded himself, muttering quietly as he gently shut the door.

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

Nellie drew in a long, steady breath of deliciously fresh air, air so clean and cold it almost felt like water running down her throat…..she held it, pent up in her lungs, with her shoulders raised, for a long pause before slowly letting it out again. She wrapped her arms tighter around herself, the loose folds of her cotton shawl flapping in the hearty breeze.

She kept her eyes closed, so that everything was blocked out except for the sound. That sound….it was the single most beautiful thing she had ever heard in her entire life.

The waves. The rushing, crashing pound of the breakers….wave after wave of rolling Atlantic surf smashing in on the cold, half-frozen sand.

Nellie sighed again and let her head tilt back, opening her eyes just wide enough to take in the sweeping expanse of ink black sky all around her. The stars were everywhere. There were so many, she felt a rush of dizziness as she tried to take them all in. They felt so close, she imagined she could lift her finger and prick it on one. She simply stood, her shoulders shivering in the cold and the sliding edges of the crashing waves rising just high enough to lick at the toes of her boots….wondering how in heaven's name she had survived her entire life trapped under that dark, perpetual ceiling of London smog.

Virginia was beautiful. She would never in her life have expected it to be so beautiful. It was just so amazingly…_clean_…the water, the grass, the village streets…there was scarcely any soot or trash to be seen. They had spent more than an hour walking through the little shipping town and their waterside neighborhood with Fitzwilliam Northing, and the entire time, Nellie hadn't been able to keep her mouth closed. There was no garbage, no piles of refuse, no bums, no street-corner drunks vomiting into the gutters----when she mentioned it, Fitzwilliam had assured that the town did indeed have its share of drunks…but the mere fact that there were none stumbling around in public at eleven in the morning was already a vast improvement----no tramps, no whores, no pickpockets….hell, she didn't spot so much as a single dead cat in the streets! Nellie hadn't imagined a place so clean and charming existed….and she had never seen a bigger sky in her entire life. The only things to break it anyplace were the steeple of Pastor Hammond's church and the sprouting branches of the forest treetops far at the edge of town. In London, it was literally impossible to escape the ever-present haze of stinking black chimney smoke---even in Hyde Park, the enormous dark clouds lingered on the edges of the air, drifting by every so often in great, translucent brown sheets, blotting the sun and carrying the foul smell of the city with them. But _here_….the sky was as blue as forget-me-not during the day, and host to an unimaginable ocean of the cosmos at night. It felt like there was no atmosphere, no gravity….nothing at all separating her from the endless sea of stars and sky. It was as if she could just push gently with her toes and send herself floating off into the night like a feather.

The frigid sea froze her feet clean through the leather of her boots, and the increasing wind nipped at her exposed skin and threw pieces of her hair loose from their pins….but as she stood there, at the edge of the beach, all alone with the night, Nellie closed her eyes and began humming a song she hadn't hummed in ages.

_By the sea, Mr. Todd, that's the life I covet….by the sea, Mr. T, oh I know you'd love it…._

_You and me, Mr. T, we can be alone…._

_We can be alone…._

"Nellie!"

The stern, low voice snapped her abruptly from her thoughts, and she yelped faintly as she spun around. Mr. Todd's face glowed a pale, almost bluish white in the light of the full moon, his sharp eyes sunken deep in cavernous shadows. His white shirt sleeves stood out like lights in the darkness. Nellie breathed deep, lifting her hand to her heart.

"For 'eaven's _sake, _Mr. T, '_ow _many times are you goin' to scare me outta me bloody skin before you learn to give a girl a bit o' _warnin' _when you come up be'ind 'er??"

He ignored her question with an exasperated roll of his eyes, wrapping his arm firmly around her shoulders and turning to march her back in the direction of the house.

"What are you doing out here?" he demanded, gruffly, but not unkindly.

Pouting her lips just slightly, Nellie accepted the warmth of his arm and leaned closer against him.

"Jus' lookin'," she answered softly. "Lookin' at the sea. Sweeney, isn't it the most lovely thing you've ever….?"

"It's freezing cold," he only muttered, his gaze fixed stubbornly toward the lighted windows of the house. "You'll catch your death of it yet, silly woman…"

Nellie sighed, smiling feebly. "But _isn't _it lovely, Mr. Todd?"

He abruptly stopped walking.

Nellie halted beside him, blinking in surprise. They were standing just a few yards from the veranda of the house, the light from the door and the windows falling across the sand and illuminating Sweeney's face. His features stood out with startling sharpness and clarity after the stretch of only moonlit darkness, and Nellie stared at his hard, scowling expression with astonishment. Even more astonishing was when all of the sharpness visibly melted away the next second, and he turned to her with a look that set her heart pounding in her chest. His voice was as deep and soft as the lulling roar of the sea as he looked at her, and said five little words that Nellie would remember for the rest of her days.

"It is lovely…..Mrs. Todd."

The moon was full.

The sea roared gently in the distance.

The stars winked and snickered.

Nellie's smile had vanished. She couldn't see the moon or the stars, and she could hear nothing above the deafening pounding of her own heart as it beat wildly in her chest, faster and faster. Her lips parted…then began to tremble. She was falling…falling forward, into those soft, black, wicked, beautiful eyes.

Her eyelids fluttered.

"Say it again," she whispered. She didn't realize that her fingertips had fisted, claw-like, into the fabric of his sleeve.

His eyelids lowered to match hers. His hand was suddenly at the back of her throat.

"Mrs. Todd," he whispered.

She closed her eyes. Her heart was in her mouth.

"Again," she barely gasped.

She felt his breath, close and hot, against her face….felt the brush of his forehead on hers.

"_Mrs. Todd."_

A pool of sweltering heat rose up from the core of her body and flushed to her fingertips. They lingered there, less than a breath apart….she could feel him trembling beneath her hands, feel the tightening of his fingers…their bodies held together, their breath puffing fast and ragged between them in thick white clouds….their lips…so close, and yet still separated….

_Mrs. Todd._

For the rest of her life…Nellie would remember those words.

She put her hands flat on his chest and pushed herself away from him. They looked at each other, wild, electric lights flashing between their eyes.

"Where's Toby?" she asked, finding herself out of breath, her chest heaving.

"Asleep," he answered, his voice equally ragged and his heart hammering beneath her hands. "By the fire downstairs."

Nellie felt as if she were about to swoon. She literally had to fight to catch her breath.

"Wait ten minutes," she growled softly, and with a final flash of lightning between their eyes, she turned and thundered up the steps of the veranda, hiking her skirts up in her free hand, her boots and the tip of her cane pounding the wood in time with the manic throbs of her heart. She didn't look back at him as she threw herself through the door, not bothering to close it after her. She didn't look back at him…she knew that if she did, she would never even make it to the second floor.

With the money sent ahead to him from Daniel, Fitzwilliam Northing had purchased not only the little two-story cottage on the beach, but also a sparse scattering of furniture. Nothing extravagant, only a few necessities….some straight-backed chairs, a chest of drawers, beds, and a small chaise, upon which the now-sleeping Toby lay snuggled with Pie beneath a layer of blankets. The fireplace was still crackling cheerily before him…Nellie slowed herself as much as she could stand to tiptoe past him toward the staircase. But even if her footsteps weren't enough to wake him, she was certain her thudding heartbeat echoing through the empty corners of the room was…in spite of the few bits of furniture and the various odds and ends they'd unpacked earlier that day, the house was still almost entirely bare; the naked walls and floors seemed to yawn around her like a cave.

But at that moment, Nellie didn't care the slightest bit about the state of the house or the utter lack of furnishings. In fact, she tore through the empty kitchen, up the staircase, and down the narrow hallways so quickly, she was standing in their bedroom before she even realized it.

The blood was pounding in her ears….her face was flushed and her stomach was dancing up and down in a bizarre, almost rhythmic kind of waltz. It was all Nellie could do to force herself to calmly close the bedroom door---rather than slam it---shrug out of her shawl and at least somewhat quietly kick off her boots. Her cane felt unnoticed to the floor. She and Sweeney's bedroom was, as of yet, completely empty save for the clothed bed, a little spindle table on which sat a single brass lamp, a mirror hanging on the wall, and their piles and piles of unpacked suitcases. It was not a large room, but on the wall opposite the door was almost fully filled with an enormous, magnificent window that ran from corner to corner of the little space, letting in a spectacular, otherworldly view of the endless sea, stretching out below them for miles and miles….and above it, the white, gleaming face of the moon, its pale light flooding into the little room and washing it with a dream-like glow.

Nellie stood for a moment, frozen in place at the door, her boots and shawl lying at her feet. Her chest was heaving so thickly that she felt her ribs pressing restlessly against the confines of her corset with each inhale. Her head was spinning, her face growing warmer and warmer by the second. She could not form the words on her lips, could not form the thought in her mind. Everything was a wild, breathless blur….the true scope and depth of everything that was about to happen had all fallen upon her with those two little words…._Mrs. Todd. _She was drowning in the ecstasy, intoxicated with the anticipation, rendered nonsensical by the inability to believe that it had really, truly happened….that she was no longer Eleanor Lovett….that no longer was Mr. Todd merely her gentleman tenant, her partner in crime, her hopeless devotion….that he was, truly and honestly…._her husband._

And that she….she was his wife.

_She was Mrs. Eleanor Todd._

She stood, paralyzed with an indescribable joy, a joy so incomprehensible it was almost something like terror….until finally, she managed to regain enough of herself to shake her head and spring into fevered motion.

With violently trembling fingers, Nellie tore at the buttons of her dress. She tangled herself in the sleeves trying to slide out of them…she tried to pull it down over her petticoat without first undoing the latch…and when she finally did manage to wriggle the billowing garment down around her ankles, she abruptly tripped over it as she took a step, and was sent sprawling---mercifully!---down onto the bed.

But her mind was reeling too fervently to even notice the clumsy mishap. Taking advantage of her abrupt flat-backed position on the bed, Nellie stuck her leg straight up into the air and began furiously rolling down her stockings….but the thick petticoats bunched around her hips, blocking her sight and hindering the reach of her arms. Growling in frustration, she jerked herself onto her knees, struggling to squirm out of the frilly skirts, when suddenly she felt the bedspread giving way beneath her….before she had time to cry out, the she had slipped off the edge of the bed and landed with a painful wooden _thump _on the floor.

Without the slightest idea why, there were suddenly tears budding in her eyes. Tears of happiness….tears of frustration….tears of complete, utter disbelief that what was about to happen was _actually _about to happen….

With the crystal beads slowly rolling down her pink cheeks, Nellie scrambled up to her feet. She was an absolute mess. She had managed to get out of the petticoats, but one of her stockings was still pulled all the way up her thigh, the other wadded fatly around her calf. The straps of her chemise had fallen down, and she was panting so heavily that her breasts strained unmercifully against the corset, threatening to burst free with every breath. Her lace garters had slid all the way to the top of her thighs, and in the frantic commotion almost every one of her hairpins had fallen out, leaving her frizzy red curls flying out in the wildest bush of hair they had yet achieved. Gasping for breath, she looked up and caught sight of herself in the mirror….she didn't know if she was on the verge of bursting fully into tears, or exploding in gales of hysterical laughter….and then….

_Click. Creeeaaak._

Doubled over on her knees and groping the side of the bed, Nellie looked up through the tendrils of hair hanging over her eyes.

Sweeney was standing in the doorway.

Nellie froze like a statue, the only movement the continuous heaving of her lost breath.

Sweeney took one step into the room, reached behind him, and slowly closed the door.

His chest was heaving almost as heavily as hers. He stared down at her with a wild-eyed, almost pained expression, his brow knit fiercely and the weight of unspoken words trembling at his mouth as he slowly shook his head back and forth. If he noticed her awkward disposition, he showed no sign of it. He was staring at her in a way he had never stared at her before; there was more than longing in his gaze…more than warmth, more than desire….more even than love….there was….a _hunger _in his face. That was the only word she could think to describe it.

Their eyes locked in a paralyzed stare, he muttered softly as he lifted his hands to his throat. Nellie felt the last threads of her conscious will snap cleanly in two as he began opening the knot of his tie.

"I couldn't wait ten minutes," he growled, his voice husky and breathless. Drawing slowly nearer and nearer to where she sat kneeling on the floor, Sweeney stepped out of his already loosened shoes, kicking them aside without looking at them.

With every inch he closed between them, Nellie felt her limbs weakening. Her eyes wide and staring, she wobbled dangerously onto her feet, her legs trembling like jelly beneath her. Before she could even gain her full balance, he was standing less than a breath away from her, the animalistic throb of his chest practically grazing her. Without speaking, without letting go of the fierce hold his eyes held over hers, he lifted his shaking hand to her face.

Nellie closed her eyes.

"Say it….one more time," she gasped.

His forehead touched hers, and she felt his other hand slip gently onto her waist.

"_Mrs. Todd."_

Her eyes shot open.

With those two words, the very last remnants of whatever invisible wall of shyness or uncertainly left between them was crumbled into dust. With those two words, all restraints were severed, all propriety abandoned, and with a burning desire that had been smoldering slowly and agonizingly for what felt like half a lifetime….they threw themselves at each other.

_Sweeney Todd….my husband…..and….and me….Eleanor __**Todd**__…._

_Mrs. Eleanor Todd, _she mouthed silently.

Nellie's arms flew around Sweeney's neck and her lips crashed down onto his, impacting with such force that she tried to gasp, but the breath was cut off and smothered by the seal of his mouth as he responded with an eagerness so vigorous, it bordered on violent. There was a suspended moment when gravity seemed to fall away beneath her---Sweeney's strong arms and clasping hands, hoisting her clean off of the floor---and then the bouncing creak of the mattress springs as the bedspread pressed into her back, hard and soft all at once, her hands still tangled in his mane of hair and her legs clenched around his waist.

Nellie had no thought. Her mind was reeling too wildly for thought. She was lost, spinning madly in a sightless abyss of ecstasy and sensation….she knew nothing beyond the searing heat of his mouth, the ever-present touch of his hands---his hands, never still, never stationary, but always darting to and fro from her neck to her arms to her waist to the inside of her thigh and back again…moving, always moving, caressing softly down her back or cupping tremblingly the curve of her cheekbone---the gentle weight of his body as he hovered over her on the bed, straddling her thighs but never quite lowering his full weight onto her. She felt the press of his knees on either side of her, heard the soft rocking of the bed, the quiet gasps and moans punctuating their endless kiss as he struggled to keep his voice down. It seemed an eternity, and at the same time scarcely an instant later, when Sweeney finally came up for air, pulling back and looking down at her, panting as if he'd been running, his collar ruined and his hair splaying manically in every direction. Nellie panted along with him, all but overcome by the intoxicating dizziness of their proximity, rendered speechless by the searing, devouring gleam in his dark eyes. For only a split second did they look at each other, held motionless with the impending ferocity of what was to come…the silence before the storm…..and then, all at once Sweeney's hands were fumbling, working furiously at the strings of her corset, still laced tightly up her front. As his fingers struggled fruitlessly to pick loose the knots, Nellie lay flat on her back, breathing heavily, her eyes rolling in her head as she burned with impatience, listening to his aggravated grunts. She looked up to see Sweeney's face wrought with impatient frustration as he wrestled the complicated lacing, but made not the slightest headway in undoing it. The heat welling inside her was too much….she would burst if she had to contain it a second longer. She moaned with exasperation and bluntly, unapologetically swatted Sweeney's hands away. He started, jerking slightly as he looked up at her in astonishment. She noticed that a faint glisten of sweat was shining on his face, and the scorching heat of desire burned that much hotter inside her. She narrowed her eyes.

"Try this, love," was as much as she could bring herself to mutter feverishly under her breath.

Clenching her teeth in a muted snarl, Nellie reached down, gripped the bottom edges of her corset, squeezed her eyes shut, and _pulled._

_RRRRRIIIIPPP!!!_

The sound of the corset---one of her older ones, _thank God_, and already on its last legs with weak and fraying thread---cleanly splitting straight up its side seam rent the air with a jarring suddenness, causing Sweeney to blink in surprise and lean back until his posture was almost straight, his hips pressed heavily against hers, his face pointed down in wide-eyed breathlessness. Nellie, not pausing for an instant, wrenched the ruined remains of the corset of from under her, flinging it aside to land with a clumsy, discarded flutter on the floor beside the bed. Air rushed immediately into her gasping lungs, making her utter a ragged cry of relief that could easily double as a moan of ecstasy. Her freed chest heaved high into the air, her back arching against the bed. She clapped her hand to her breast and gripped her hammering heart, letting her eyes close for a brief moment as she drank in the delicious sensation of cool air caressing the skin of her torso, covered now by nothing more than the thin separation of her silk chemise. When she opened her eyes, the look that she saw in the bright black orbs staring back at her seemed to suck the breath from her body all over again.

Sweeney was kneeling fully upright over her prostrate form, gaping down at her with his face twisted into an expression that Nellie could not name. It was utter blankness, lunatic excitement, emotionless awe, and paralyzing terror all at once….but more than anything, Sweeney looked as if he was fighting to hold himself back, gritting his teeth to keep from falling on her and veritably tearing her to pieces in his eagerness. For an agonizingly long moment, they sat there without moving, each staring at the other. Nellie felt she would go out of her head with frustration any second….she had just reached up and seized the front of his shirt in both fists, preparing to yank him down on top of her if necessary, when suddenly she realized he was speaking. The blood was rushing so fiercely through her ears, for a moment all she could hear was a faint humming noise….she blinked, squinted at him incredulously, as the words gradually became clear.

Sweeney had, without her realizing it, doubled over, his back arching like a cat, his arms locked straight and propping himself up with his hands on either side of Nellie's head. His face hung over hers, the sound of his continually panting breath breaking through his voice between nearly every word.

"I don't deserve this."

Nellie squeezed her eyes shut, her teeth bared in the agony of longing.

His voice was dead and monotone, and yet at the same time full of more emotion than she had ever heard in him.

"I don't deserve…._you."_

Nellie's insides surged with fire….she gripped the front of Sweeney's shirt tighter and pulled him closer down to her.

"Neither do I you," she cried, struggling to form coherent words through the choking sensation at the back of her throat. "Neither do I you. _But 'ere we are_."

"Nellie, Nellie…._Nellie…._I…I don't…w-what if I can't….it's been so many ye---"

"Sweeney_…."_

"No! _Listen_ to me, Nellie!" he pleaded, jerking her suddenly by the shoulders, forcing her to open her eyes and look at him. "Listen to me! I….I….I…."

But then, just as quickly as the urgency had risen in his voice, it died out again, and he couldn't finish whatever it was he'd been going to say. The words trailed off into silence, and he was left staring helplessly down at her, unable to communicate to her the fleeting moment of uncertainty and desire.

Nellie swallowed. As calmly as she was able, she raised her shoulders from the bed, hung her arms around Sweeney's neck, and whispered softly in his ear.

"I understand, love. It's alright. I know that it's…that it's 'ard for you. I understand."

Her fingers gripped tighter into his back. She couldn't help but smile longingly as she gazed up at the ceiling, relishing the solidity of his body in her embrace.

"Neither of us deserves this, love. We're….we're guilty, both of us. We can never undo the things we've done. But…but we're _'ere, _love. We're alive. We're together. We've been given another chance….another chance, to _live…_to _try _to live….as we ought to 'ave lived before. We 'ave the chance to try and live as…as _good_ _people. _We will always be guilty, Sweeney. Always. But….don' you see? We'll be guilty together. _We'll be guilty together._"

There was a moment of silence. The moon shone through the window. Nellie hung, suspended inches off the bed, holding her breath as she waited. When he finally spoke, there were unshed tears and a half-joking smile mingling together in his voice.

"I…I haven't….done this_, _in…in so long…."

She closed her eyes and hugged him tighter. "I know," she answered gently. "It'll be alrigh'."

"Nellie. Tell me what to do."

She opened her eyes, and looked up at the ceiling….but it wasn't the ceiling she saw. She slowly let her arms slide from his neck, her body falling gently back down to lie on the bed. She looked up, and stared him straight in the eye. Without turning her face, she reached up, took his wrist in her fingers, and moved his hand over her breast, pressing his palm down firmly over her heartbeat, and whispered.

"_Make love to me, Mr. T."_

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

It was dawn.

He hadn't slept.

He had _tried_ to sleep, and discovered it utterly impossible.

_Sweeney had fallen down from the surreal summit of his ecstasy, his chest heaving like a panting animal and beads of sweat budding over every inch of his skin, despite the sharp chill in the air of their bedroom. Like a tree timbering from a mountaintop, he'd fallen down, flopping limply as a wet rag on his back beside her, the springs of the mattress creaking as they bobbed gently up and down together._

_For a full five minutes, he chased after his breath, never once coming close to catching it. He stared straight up at the dark ceiling, his eyes wide, scarcely blinking, never moving and yet never still, even for an instant. His mouth was open, the air rushing down his throat as his pulse raced. He felt as if every muscle in his body had been liquefied, and yet at the same time he felt rigid, tight….like a rope stretched taught just short of its breaking point. His heart pounded so wildly it was actually painful…a delicious, screaming, living pain….the pain of something being created. He was born with that heartbeat. With that heartbeat, he became alive…he moved for the first time after existing sixteen years as a lifeless corpse, he breathed for the first time after sixteen years as an animated doll._

_In a dazed trance he gazed up at the ceiling. An eternity seemed to pass between the paramount instant their bodies had separated, and the moment they turned, almost simultaneously, to look at each other. They were laying side by side on their backs, the comforter and blankets of the bed tossed and tangled across them almost beyond a recognizable shape. _

_In the moonlight he could see the glitter of thin, delicate perspiration sparkling on her skin. Her thick lips were parted in something that couldn't quite be called a smile….more like pure speechlessness. Or, in Nellie's case….not quite __**pure **__speechlessness. Her chest heaved, her arms lifted up over her head and her fingers gripping the headboard, as she gasped, much louder than he would have expected,_

"_Well done, Mr. T."_

_A split second after the words had left her mouth, Sweeney's lungs filled with air and he burst out laughing. _

_For the first few seconds, the sound of his own laughter frightened him. Laughter….that kind of real, human, unmediated laughter….was a thing that he could not remember the last time he had experienced. He had long since forgotten what it was like._

_And seconds after, the sound of it was jolted and sent stumbling by the heel of Nellie's hand pounding smartly over his sternum. Her palm made a sharp slapping sound against the bare skin of his chest._

"_You ass!" she accused angrily, yet breaking down into giggles even as she said it. Sweeney coughed a few times, then rolled onto his side away from her, still incapacitated. He squeezed his eyes shut and held his hand to his forehead, gasping for breath between waves of laughter._

"_What's so funny, you great git?" Nellie demanded, holding the sheets to her chest and sitting bolt upright in the bed._

_He made the mistake of turning to look at her and was paralyzed all over again. He gripped his aching side with one hand and dashed fledgling tears from his eyes with the other._

_But it wasn't Nellie herself that he was laughing at. The sound of her voice, and the sight of her lying naked beside him with her hair flown loose from every last pin and shooting practically straight out in every direction---coupled with the fact that he'd happened to turn and look at her just as she was rolling her mouth and raising her eyebrows in an absurd, breathless expression---had triggered his laughter, but it was only the match that had lit a fuse that had been there long since. No…it wasn't her he was laughing at. _

_Perhaps, when he stopped, and truly let himself think about it…..perhaps, he wasn't really laughing at all._

_Perhaps….he was crying._

"_What??" Nellie repeated, socking him again with her fist. Still breathless and with glistening eyes, Sweeney sat up, grinning at her face and coughing over the last lingering chuckles. She gave him a scowl that hardly qualified as a scowl, since she was unable to keep her smile out of it. _

_His smile softened. He shook his head slowly, lifting his hand to run it through her wild, flyaway tresses. His fingers got stuck halfway, and he fought to keep from laughing again._

"_Nothing," he answered quietly. "Nothing at all."_

_It could not have been further from nothing._

"_**Make love to me, Mr. T."**_

_He hadn't been able to breathe when she whispered that. He had been certain he was going to die, right then and there. He was certain that his heart could never withstand the manic pace at which it was hammering against his chest. He was certain it would fail that very moment, and he would simply keel forward right on top of her._

_But he didn't. The seconds kept on ticking, his pulse kept creeping faster and faster._

_Her hand over his, pressing him closer….his hand over her….her…her…._

_His mouth was dry. Their bedroom, which seconds ago had been stiff and chilly, was instantly stiflingly hot. Sweat was soaking his collar. His tongue ran over his lips of its own volition, his eyes staring down at her, locked immovably on their entwined hands._

_Her heartbeat was radiating beneath his palm, surging upward through his hand and coursing through his entire arm. Her soft breast rose and fell, swelling gently under his touch with each inhaling breath. Her delicate, thin chemise---now the only thing separating him from her bare skin---was slipping off of both shoulders, sending him reeling instantaneously back to memories of a dim hayloft in a drafty barn in the dead of winter….and he immediately realized that that day in the barn, that moment of insatiable lust and almost unbearable temptation….that moment that he'd felt his entire body was in danger of erupting in unquenchable flames of desire…._

…_.that had been __**nothing**__, compared with this._

_A shiver rippled up through his spine, and Sweeney's eyes fell closed as a low, exquisite moan escaped him. His shoulders slumped, as if every ounce of tension had left his body…he felt boneless, melted, unable even to sit up straight. _

_And then, without any warning, a bolt of tension shot through him, so strongly and suddenly that his eyes popped open. Waves of sensation, like repeated jolts of electricity, were coursing up from beneath his belt and circulating through his entire body. He jerked his head down and immediately saw the source of the unearthly tides of feeling….Nellie's hands were working swiftly at the buckle on his belt. He sat there, frozen like a statue, watching her as she expertly undid the clasp and then attacked the buttons underneath. He groaned again, the familiar pulses in his lower region coming harder and faster with every firm touch of her fingers._

_Suddenly he heard her voice, breathless with excitement._

"_Don' jus' sit there, love, 'elp me!" she demanded, with only the faintest trace of a joke._

_Sweeney shook himself, struggling to pull back his reeling consciousness. He was so incapacitated by the insane pleasure that he could scarcely force his fingers to function, but he began fumbling hastily at the buttons of his vest. Nellie, long since through with the opening of his trousers, reached up to help him and undid three in the time it took him to finish one. When every button was at last opened, she waited not one second before seizing each side of his shirt front and ripping it open, sliding his halfway down his arms in her eagerness. The cold air hit his naked chest so sharply he was amazed he didn't begin to radiate steam….his skin was burning, his body pulsing and quivering with the heated ecstasy of what was to come. Before he realized it, his shirt and vest were a heap on the floor, and he was struggling to slide of out his pants. After almost a full minute of finagling and muttering curses beneath his breath, he had at last managed to rid himself of the aggravating garment, shaking it off with a final kick of his leg and sending it fluttering to the other side of the room. _

_He turned to looked back at Nellie…..and stopped._

_She saw the stunned look on his face and smiled softly….almost shyly. Her already flushed cheeks darkened a faint shade of rosy pink._

"_Alrigh' for an ol' hag?" she muttered, grinning lopsidedly._

_Sweeney didn't respond. His mouth hung open, his jaw quivering soundlessly as he stared. The white chemise lay, draped and wrinkled on the side of bed, half slipping onto the floor. Nellie looked him straight in the eye, sitting up straight at the head of the bed, the blankets bunched over her legs. Most of her auburn hair had fallen down and was hanging messily around her shoulders….but not enough to cover her now-bare chest. She sat there, just looking at him….soft and beautiful and curved in shadows of moonlight._

_He couldn't speak. But he moved his lips to silently form the words._

_**You're**__…..__**my wife.**_

_After that, everything became an indeterminate blur._

_The broad warmth of their skin, so close they seemed to meld together into one….the softness of her breasts pressed against his chest….his face, buried so deep in her hair it almost muted the sounds of his gasps and moans…..Nellie's soft cries, growing louder and louder until her voice pierced the air with her shrill sounds of climax….her fingers, digging in between his shoulder blades….her legs, his legs, their arms, their necks…always moving, never still, never waiting…everything a wild jangle of limbs, a twisting, turning puzzle of crying, breathing, screaming elation….in a word, love. Love as he had never imagined love could be._

_Sixteen years. Sixteen bloody years._

_And all inside of a single moment, it felt as if it had been no more than the blink of an eye._

And now, hours later….it was dawn.

And he hadn't slept.

Her heartbeat was loud in his ear. When he had first laid his head on her breast hours ago, the sound had been a racing, fluttering trill, like the beating of birds' wings, fast and constant, her chest heaving up and down as she breathed heavily through her mouth, shaking with trails of laughter every few minutes as she recovered from the rush of their second union. Then, as she'd gradually fallen asleep, her hands stroking slower and slower along his back until they finally stopped moving, her heart had slowed to a calm, rhythmic pulse. And then….the _snoring. _Oh, the snoring. It was like music. He had listened to it until the sun came up.

Sweeney gazed blankly at the ocean horizon through their window with half-lidded eyes, watching as the navy blue of nighttime slowly gave way to thin washes faint, pale yellow and forget-me-not, followed soon after by orchid pink. He could hear, distantly, the eternal sound of the breakers pounding the shore. It was too early for gulls, but the sound of smaller birds twittering their morning songs filtered in between the crashes of the waves.

Sweeney closed his eyes briefly and yawned. Carefully, moving slowly so as not to wake her, he pushed himself up to rest on his arms and look down at her. He smiled at the faint, fading red mark left by the side of his face on the pale skin between her breasts. Easing off of her to lay on his side, he quietly pulled the sheets up to her shoulders and propped himself up on one elbow beside her. In the dim light of the breaking dawn, he could just make out the contours of her face, the glow of her skin, luminescent even in the semi-darkness. Her auburn hair was a mane of ringlets spilling off the pillow. He delicately pushed his fingers through the strands at the crown of her head, gazing down at the peaceful expression on her blank face.

Love with Nellie had been like nothing he'd ever experienced. When he looked deep, deep inside, to the innermost core of his own honesty, he knew in his heart that he felt something with her he had never felt with Lucy. He couldn't put a name to it….it was just…._something…._a passion, a _wildness_, a recklessness without temper or reason. Her practicality, her sharp and efficient ways of moving, her appropriate-as-always sense of fractured propriety…all of it had flown straight out the window the moment she had ripped that corset off. A _wildness. _That was the only way he could think to describe it. It was a _wildness…._and, secretly, it excited him.

Lucy---not that he didn't love her, of course…he had loved her, in those days of his youth, with a passion almost bordering on madness---but…it was just that, well…._Lucy_….the first time, on their wedding night, there had just been something too….too _shy, _about her, too uncertain. She'd been as timid as a mouse…moving slowly, almost nervously, continually looking to him for reassurance. And during, she'd been so quiet….not a word, not a gasp, not a _sound. _Making love to Lucy for the first time had been like listening to the breeze through a willow tree.

_Nellie, _on the other hand….

True to form, as always, Nellie had practically carried on an entire one-sided conversation. It was amazing she had been able to fit so many words in between her almost constant cries and gasps….he quickly lost track of how many times she said his name and in how many different ways….the ones he could remember were _sir, darling, Sweeney, _and_ Mr. T, _but he was fairly certain there had to be more. He half believed he'd actually heard her saying something about what kind of Persian rugs they ought to buy for the parlor downstairs at some point, but he had laughed and chalked it up to a random burst of nonsensical thought brought on by her excitement, because the moment after she'd had her head thrown back off the edge of the bed, practically screaming, _"Like the sea, Mr. Todd!!"_ He chuckled softly just thinking about it. And here she was now, so silent, so still, deep into her sixth hour of unbroken sleep. She had even stopped snoring for the moment, the breath rushing slowly through her minutely parted lips.

As he continued to stroke absently through the loose strands of her hair, Sweeney's smile faded.

_Eleanor Todd._

_Nellie._

_Mrs. Lovett._

His eyes narrowed on her face, his jaw firming.

_She'd been so many things to him….so many different names….but somehow, he knew that deep down, she would always be Mrs. Lovett to him. _

_Mrs. Lovett….the only person in the world who had known what he truly was….and had somehow loved him anyway._

_Mrs. Lovett. So different than Lucy had been….darker, and harder…stronger…and yet smiling and bubbly at the same time….practical, and clever, with sporadic, unpredictable throes of genius greater than she herself understood….kind, and sweet, and yet at the same time capable of grotesque, inhuman atrocities rivaled only by his own. But she had changed, since he first saw her that grey day so many lifetimes ago in the pie shop. She had changed….__**he **__had changed._

"_We will always be guilty. But we'll be guilty __**together**__."_

_Guilty…..together._

Half of his smile quirked up again.

Two murderers….living their lives together as well as they could. Living with sins that were impossible to atone for….but living with them _together_.

_Maybe, __**that**__…..her love…..their life together…..maybe that was the salvation that Sweeney had been looking for, all along._

Years ago, he had used to tell Lucy that she was the sunshine in the spring of his life. If that were true….then Nellie was the fire to keep him warm in the winter.

Slowly, gently, so as not to wake her, he leaned forward and touched a soft, single kiss to her forehead. Despite the lightness of his touch, Nellie still groaned in her sleep, moving her arms to stretch briefly above her head before collapsing again, rolling to her side and pulling half the blanket with her.

Sweeney smiled and lay down behind her, closing his eyes and letting his face rest in the thick, fragrant pillow of her wild hair.

_The fire in the winter of his life_.

_Mrs. Eleanor Lovett Todd._

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

It was the seventeenth of April the day that she brought them home from the store. It was the first of May before she could work up the nerve to take them out of their secret hiding place at the back of her underwear drawer and walk with them, clutched nervously to her chest, outside onto the veranda where Sweeney was sitting.

It was late in the evening, about an hour after supper. _Auntie Todd's Tea and Pastry Parlor_ had been closed that day, it being Sunday, but even so she and Toby had spent a good six hours in the kitchen preparing for the next week of business. Dough had to be rolled, preserves had to be opened ( she'd had to buy them at the market this time around, but she vowed next year to make her own ), fruits had to be candied, chocolate had to be tempered, tea-sets had to be washed, lace tablecloths had to be scrubbed and aired out.

The house Fitzwilliam Northing had bought for them had renovated nearly perfectly into the tea and bakery of Nellie's dreams; the wide kitchen surrounded by enormous windows made for a sunny indoor sitting area with a beautiful view, and the double set of woodstoves was truthfully much nicer than the soot-ridden old monster she'd had to struggle daily with back in London. The wooden veranda that wrapped around the back of the house had been fitted with little tables, chairs, and shade umbrellas so that customers could sit outside on hot days and look at the ocean.

The first few weeks after their move-in had been spent solely on acquiring furniture, and though they had used up a fair portion of the money given them by Johanna---much to Sweeney's chagrin…_though it couldn't be helped,_ as she'd tried to console him each night afterwards---they had managed not only to stock the house and the teashop with all the necessary accoutrements, but to cram it with quite a decent number of knick-knacks….a quantity of painted ceramic animals, several vases full of dried brown tea-roses, Persian rugs ( Sweeney had somehow guessed that she wanted them before she even brought it up, much to her surprise and bewilderment ), paintings of birds, flowers, and American presidents ( "Can't 'urt to cozy up to the natives a bit," Nellie had muttered in her explanation of them ) and a single taxidermy fox who stood perched slyly on a Chinese cherry-board bureau with silk lavender table runners. Indeed, the only thing it was missing were the pink curtains Nellie had always imagined

( Sweeney and Toby had managed to talk her out of them ); but even so, she could not have dreamt of a nicer place to start up business again.

The street side of the house was lined with a charming wooden boardwalk running over the sand between the road and the rows of houses, so there was always a healthy flow of foot traffic; it hadn't taken more than a week after the opening for practically every lady on their side of Norfolk between the ages of twelve and sixty to hear about "the lovely little English tea shop that was just opened up by a lovely, _real_ little English lady, straight off the boat from London." News, Nellie quickly discovered, traveled even faster in a small seaport town than in an enormous swarming burg. Not only that, but she soon found out that it was rather unusual in Norfolk for people to house their businesses inside their own homes, and so she had the advantage not only of exotic foreignism, but of novelty on her side as well. Business had taken off like a pistol shot; it was the rare day that she even had time to sit down in between jumping up to pour another cup of tea or wrap another scone, or smile politely at another stooped old woman or chatter happily with another married housewife. Her injured leg, which had been slowly but surely recuperating over the last few months, had reached the point where she could stand to put weight on it for reasonable stretches of time; but every now and then, she would feel the familiar twinge of aching pain shooting through it, and she knew she would be gimping the rest of the day. Toby was ever her right hand….she would never have made it through the noon rushes without him. He hopped from table to table in his white apron like a jack rabbit, taking orders faster than she could fill them, and somehow managing to keep his pleasant demeanor even through the endless choruses of _oohing _and _ahhhing _and cheek-pinching he was forced to endure from lady after lady after lady who each thought he was "Just the _sweetest _little thing!"

_Apparently_, Nellie quirked a private smile at every time she noticed him being fawned over by someone's mother or grandmother, _there was nothing quite so adorable to an American woman as a scrawny little boy with a Cockney brogue. _

And Sweeney….._oh, Sweeney_…..

To be absolutely fair, he was trying his hardest. He really was. He did his best to help with the cleaning and the scrubbing, and he was always the first to attack the mounds of pots and pans that needed washing at the end of every day, but…._bless him, the poor man…._there was simply no getting around it. When it came to matters of the kitchen, Mr. Todd was a useless bag of thumbs. The thin, pale hands that were so deftly skilled, so steady and precise when it came to gliding a razor effortlessly over the contours of a man's face, seemed to become inexplicably clumsy and fumbling the moment they tried to hold a teapot or roll a biscuit. The first few days after the teashop opened---but only with the aid of an endless supply of encouragement from Toby---Sweeney had taken his first timid crack at helping with table service. Though Nellie had almost laughed herself sick at the sight of him in an apron, the humor quickly dissipated (…well…._almost _dissipated ) when he tripped backwards over Pie, who was scuffling constantly underfoot, and dropped an entire tray of full cups, shattering all but three of them. The next day he'd stepped on an older lady's hem as she was leaving the store and accidentally tore a foot of fabric from her skirt, and the day after that he'd sweetened a pot of Darjeeling with salt instead of sugar. The day after that he somehow managed to pour an entire pitcher of cream down the front of a lady's dress. The day after that, he had kept himself busy upstairs until the store was closed.

That had been almost two months ago.

Now, as Nellie quietly shut the back door behind her and stepped out onto the veranda, the polished wooden box clutched protectively in her arms, she felt suddenly overcome by a paralyzing nervousness. She opened her mouth to speak, but found it strangely dry. A light, warm breeze from across the beach blew past them, wafting the loose tendrils of her hair and the small frills of lace on the neck of her dress.

Sweeney was sitting at one of the tables, a cup of cold, untouched tea still clutched in his hands from when she'd handed it to him twenty minutes ago. He was holding it stock still in midair, halfway to his lips, but he appeared to have forgotten it was there. His head was turned and his gaze fixed far away at the edge of the shoreline, where Toby was kneeling by the waterside building something in the sand. Pie was tearing in circles around the beach like a frenzied orange blur, chasing and yapping endlessly after the seagulls and scattering them in enormous fluttering blizzards of white wings and squawking.

Swallowing thickly, Nellie sat down in a chair beside him, discretely slipping the wooden box into her lap underneath the table. Sweeney jumped slightly at the sound of her chair scraping the deck, jerking to look at her and almost spilling his tea.

"_There_ you are," he muttered darkly, blinking and setting the cup down on the table. "What were you doing for so long?"

"Oh, nothing, just….just busy upstairs, love."

"Toby wanted to take a walk down the beach. It'll be too dark now."

"I'll tell 'im I'm sorry. We'll go tomorrow."

Sweeney shrugged and turned away, looking back out over the rolling sands. They sat together at the table for a long, long moment without speaking. Nellie continually kept glancing at him out of the corner of her eyes, biting her lips and drumming her fingers restlessly on the wooden box hidden on her lap.

_Go on, you great coward….just do it already, you won't find a better time….just __**do **__it…._

But just as she finally worked up enough gumption to open her mouth to try and broach the difficult topic, Sweeney suddenly spoke, making her jump and quickly clamp her lips shut again.

"He'll be turning twelve in autumn, won't he?"

Nellie paused, starting in surprise and following his gaze to look at Toby, who was kneeling off at the edge of the water and absorbed in heaping more sand on his castle. She looked back at Sweeney, trying to read his expression….but his face was as blank as a mask. His brows never moved from their harsh, knitted stare.

Nellie blinked, her eyes softening as she sensed something….a hidden emotion radiating out from him. She nodded gently.

"That's right, October the first. 'E told me they let the boys at the work'ouse choose their own birthdays, since it didn't make no difference to them any'ow. I can 'ardly believe it, though….our little Toby, twelve years old! 'Fore you know it 'e'll be a great tall, gangly thing….'e's already outgrown 'alf the things we bought 'im in London, an' nex' thing you know 'e'll be----"

"Nellie," Sweeney interrupted softly. His hands resting on the table were suddenly closed into fists. "Do…do you….think….I'm a good father?"

The question blind-sided Nellie into silence. She sat there a moment, her eyes wide and mouth frozen open in mid sentence. She stared at him, blinking.

"Do I think….what on earth kind o' question is that, Mr. T? _Do I think you're a good father? _I think you're the best father any little boy could ask for….or any _girl_, for that matter," she quickly amended. "I think you're more than Toby ever wished for in 'is life. What's this about, love?"

His face was still empty and staring, but his shoulders were gradually beginning to hunch. He looked down at the table.

"Nothing," he mumbled tonelessly. "Never mind."

Nellie narrowed her eyes firmly. "No, _not never mind, __**tell **_me. Why all this doubt all of a sudden?"

A ray of emotion cracked through his stony visage…his eyes narrowed and the straight line of his mouth wavered.

"It doesn't matter. You've….done wonderfully with the shop. You're supporting us very well."

Nellie's eyes widened. "Mr….Mr. T, I'm not….it's _our _business, love, not _mine. _It's jus' my silly name on the door, it's not as if….we're _all _pitching in, it's not as if I---!"

"Forget it," Sweeney muttered gravely.

"Listen, Sweeney, if this is about those accidents of yours in the tea shop, I told you already_, it's alright! _You did the best you could, that's all I could ever---"

"_Forget it, _I said!" he snapped angrily.

Nellie stared at him, bewildered and upset. There was a distinct edge creeping into his voice, a kind of uneasiness she didn't like. But just as she was about to lift a hand to his shoulder and say something, he suddenly turned to her again, his brow knit apologetically and his cold eyes abruptly lit with traces of a subtle desperation.

"Nellie….I'm sorry. I don't mean to…I just…I never wanted it to be this way."

She narrowed her eyes, laying her hand on top of the table and slowly creeping it forward until it rested reassuringly over his. Her heart beat faster when he accepted her touch and wrapped his fingers tightly around hers.

"Never wanted it to be _what _way?"

Sweeney sighed heavily in frustration, running his free hand through the roots of his hair.

"The way things were in London. You spent your whole life there working yourself to the bone just to get by, and….and now you're doing the same thing here. You and the boy spend every waking hour on the damned tea shop, and I….I can't so much as…."

Sensing the direction he was headed in, Nellie quickly tried to cut him off.

"Don' you say such things, love, don' you even think it! You've done _more _than---"

"I promised I would take care of you, Nellie!" he snapped, turning to pin her with a piercing stare. He held her gaze for a brief moment, then exhaled slowly, his shoulders slumping further down and the volume draining from his voice. "I'm…I'm your husband," he said softly, almost in a whisper. "I'm supposed to provide for you…_and_ for our son. I promised myself, Nellie. I promised myself I would take care of you, the way….the way I couldn't take care of my family….before."

A faint breeze ruffled their hair and wafted the hanging ends of the tablecloth. Pie barked, the seagulls crowed, and the waves pounded the sand.

Nellie stared at Sweeney with her lips parted, her heart beating in the back of her mouth. There was a stiff lump in her throat.

_Oh, Sweeney….._

"Mr. T," she whispered dryly, her voice trembling, her eyes narrowing in hurt and disbelief. "You mustn't talk that way. You've taken better care of us than anyone ever could. We….we owe everythin' to you. We owe you our lives. Why if it weren't for you, we….we'd be…."

She trailed off, unable to finish the thought, shaking her head slowly and wondering how in the world he could possibly think he hadn't taken good care of them. Sweeney sighed and looked down at the table again.

"I didn't want things to be this way," he simply muttered in response. "I…I did think, once, that maybe….maybe, I could…."

Nellie leaned further forward, her ears perked up. "What? Could what?"

But just as quickly as the spark came to his voice, it went rushing out in a long, slow exhale. He hunched down again, shaking his head as if in defeat.

"It doesn't matter," he grumbled beneath his breath. "Probably couldn't even do it anymore…."

_That was it. _Nellie didn't waste another second. Her heart pounding, she tightened her hands on the corners of the box as she pulled it out from her lap and set it quietly on the table, never once looking at it. Her eyes were fixed on Sweeney, her throat constricted with emotion.

_How could she have not known he was feeling this way? She had suspected for several weeks now that he was bored, restless….a little cabin fever, at the worst….that was why she'd bought the box when she found it for a bargain at the general store, but…never, __**never**__ had she imagined he was having feelings like __**this.**__ How could she have been so blind, so insensitive? Laughing at him in the apron…brushing off all of his accidents in the tea shop, never once stopping to think how it made him feel…putting off showing him the box for so long, waiting, hoping he would be the first to hint at the idea, just because she was too much of a coward to bring it up herself……what kind of wife was she?_

She pursed her lips firmly as he glanced up, first squinting curiously at the wooden box, then looking questioningly up at her.

_Well, no more._

"You mustn't talk that way, Sweeney," she whispered heavily, looking him straight in the eye. "I….I couldn't ever explain to you 'ow wrong you are. You're all we've got, Sweeney. You're all _I've _got. You…you're my 'ole world, now."

As she spoke, Nellie saw the changes wash over his expression, but couldn't put into words exactly what they were. He looked simply….overcome, flooded with a feeling he didn't know how to express. He looked as if he deeply wanted to say something, but couldn't find the words. She noticed in the corner of her eye that his hand that was still resting on the table suddenly moved, making a soft closing motion in the air as if he were grasping for hand, forgetting that it was no longer there. After a long moment of silence, he cleared his throat, tilting his head toward the box.

"What is that?" he asked timidly, almost as if trying to change the subject.

Nellie closed her eyes for a moment, took a deep, steadying breath, and slowly let it out. Sternly tightening her jaw, willing all of her courage into a single, calm motion, she slid the box across the table to him.

"They're………..a present," she said quietly after a long pause.

Sweeney glanced up at her with uneasiness in his eyes. It was obvious he already knew what was inside. Nellie didn't smile. She only nodded, pursing her lips and trying to reassure him through her gaze.

"Open it," she urged him gently.

Slowly….ever so slowly….Sweeney undid the single clasp, lifting up the small wooden lid of the box as if it weighed fifty pounds. He slowly, slowly let it fall back to rest on the table.

The waning, golden sunlight passed in one dancing flash across the thin, sleek lines, then went perfectly still. Sweeney let out a long, shallow breath. Several moments passed. He didn't look up at her. He stared down silently into the box.

_Of course he had already known what they were._

Without speaking, Sweeney gingerly ran the tips of his fingers smoothly along the spine of the first razor. As carefully as if it were made of glass, he slid it slowly out of the red velvet lining, lifting it up and turning it in front of his eyes, tilting it to catch the gleam of the sun.

Nellie struggled to keep her mouth shut, but the volatile mixture of excitement and nerves was too much to hold in. The longer he went without saying anything, the more she began to chatter nervously.

"I….I do 'ope they're alright, love. There were on'y two sets at the store, and the others were used and all scratched up, so I thought…..I know they ain't like your…er….your old ones, but I thought….I thought maybe they'd do. I know they ain't 'alf as lovely…not like your old chaste silver, but I thought…..now, don' you go gettin' any silly ideas that I'm tryin' to push you into anythin', Mr. T, I _mean _it….you don't 'ave to do _anythin' _you ain't ready for, not a _bloody thing…._an' I _mean _that, Mr. T, so don' you dare think you've got to do _anythin'…_its_…_its just, I….I jus' thought, maybe…..maybe, since you seemed so…..so….I jus' thought maybe you'd….you might like them."

For another long, still moment, he didn't say a word. Nellie stuffed her hands into her lap, her eyes fixed on his long slender hands as he picked up each of the six razors in turn, rolling them over in his palms, opening them carefully and inspecting the shining blades, sliding his fingers over the handles. His face was completely blank, his eyes wide and scrupulous.

It was true….they weren't anything close to the beauty and quality of his old silver set. The blades were silver, and they had looked clean and sharp and straight enough to Nellie…but then, how was she to know the difference? The handles were nothing more than carved bone, little pale, faintly yellowed plates inlaid with patterns of roses and birds. They were nice, and they looked sturdy….but that was all. They weren't beautiful. They didn't glisten. But they were the best she'd been able to do.

Finally, after looking over each razor from tip to tip and carefully replacing them each in the velvet lined case, Sweeney turned and looked at her. She jumped when his eyes met hers, her heart instantly throbbing again. Her mouth was dry and she swallowed and croaked out timidly, dying to know, and yet at the same time dreading the answer…..

"Are….are they….alright?"

He didn't say a word. His empty expression didn't so much as flicker….but for one, fleeting instant, she was certain she had seen a brilliant flare of emotion dancing in his black eyes. She barely had time to see what it was, however, before he had suddenly leaned forward and closed his lips over hers.

His hand rose to the back of her neck and held her into the kiss. Her head swam, her heart pounding in her mouth as she let her eyes fall closed and she slipped into the heat of his touch. Amazing, how his kisses made her feel, even after months of being married to him….how completely and utterly helpless they rendered her, how they filled her with an excitement and an incredulity so wild it was all she could do to maintain her balance. And yet….even as she melted into the deepening press of his mouth, she couldn't help but wonder…._what did this mean?_

When they finally parted, Nellie blinked, looking into his face was utter confusion.

"So……..are they alright, love?"

His statuesque visage cracked, and he actually smiled, shaking his head back and forth in a brief spurt of humor before again growing cold and serious.

"Yes. They're alright."

She didn't smile. "Then…..what is it?"

He took a deep breath, narrowing his eyes. "Nellie…..do you….do you really believe I could do it again? Do you really think I….I could be….what I was?"

He trailed off, searching her face desperately for answers. Firmly, unwaveringly, she lifted her hand and held the side of his face, her thumb tracing gently beneath his eye.

"I do," she answered quietly. "If it's what you want, Sweeney…..if it's what will make you 'appy again….I believe you can do it. Don' you know, darlin? I believe you can do anything."

He gazed deeply into her eyes, lights of uncertainty still dashing back and forth behind his unreadable black orbs. He exhaled, and turned to look back down at the box of razors, lying open and innocent in the fading sunlight. He shook his head and snickered suddenly, his mouth quirking up in a self-mocking smile.

"Nellie. How did I ever live without you all those years?"

She grinned, leaning forward and placing a swift, sharp peck on his temple, then rubbing his shoulder briskly.

"Can't say, love. Can't say."

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

_Not liked I dreamed._

_Not like you remember._

_But we could get by._

_We could get by._

He heard it late one night as he was finishing sweeping up his barbershop. The downstairs parlor, what with its large windows, direct doorway to the kitchen, and wide floor space, had been easy enough to convert with his new barbering chair and table…but being positioned where it was in the house, he was directly beneath he and Nellie's bedroom. Today had been so busy in the tea shop as well as his parlor that Toby hadn't had a spare moment to sweep up the hair, and so Sweeney was attending to it last thing before he went upstairs for the night. That was when he heard it.

He instantly stopped sweeping, the broom frozen in place and his body rigid. He looked up at the ceiling above him, his brow tightening as he listened. For a moment, everything was quiet….but then, it came again, muffled faintly by the separation of the floor, but all too clear nonetheless.

It was Nellie. She was crying.

Sweeney didn't bother stopping to take off his apron or jacket. He tossed the broom into a corner without looking at it and made a beeline for the staircase, tiptoeing past Toby's room as swiftly and silently as possible.

The door to their bedroom was cracked, a long beam of dim lamplight shining into the dark hallway. Moving calmly and quietly, Sweeney gently opened it and stepped inside, shutting it behind him. The moment the clasp clicked shut, Nellie jumped in surprise, whirling around to look at him. She was sitting on the edge of the bed facing the enormous picture window, the sea of black stretching out beyond her into the night. The moment he saw her, Sweeney's lips parted in a small sigh, a faint pang gripping his heart. Nellie's face was streaked with tears, her makeup smudged around her eyes and running in two clean black trickles down her pale cheeks. She snorted, hurriedly swiping at her eyes with the cuff of her sleeve, trying in vain to wipe away some of the black. She turned her back to him, sniffling and rubbing her nose.

Sweeney gently shrugged out of his barbering coat, letting it fall on the bedspread as he crossed the room and sat down beside her on the bed. She kept her face down, hiccupping and sniffing. She hadn't changed out of her clothes yet….she was still dressed in the green and white candy-striped dress she'd worn that day.

Sweeney's eyes narrowed comfortingly as he cautiously moved his hand to her far shoulder.

"Why are you crying?" he asked plainly.

Much to his chagrin, his words provoked nothing but a fresh torrent of tears and muffled sobbing. Nellie gasped and cried noisily despite her clear efforts to smother the sound with her hands. She turned and buried her face in his shoulder, smearing his white shirt sleeve with running makeup. Immediately, Sweeney knew something was wrong…..very wrong. He'd seen her cry enough times before to usually be able to form a rough idea of what he was dealing with, and he knew right away that this was no minor upset, no passing whim. _No….it took something serious to bring her to this level._

He put his arms around her and pulled her closer to his chest, fighting to keep his face straight and calm as he let his chin rest in her hair. She accepted the embrace without a moment's hesitation, folding into him and stifling her cries into his vest. He soothingly rubbed one hand up and down her lower back.

"Shhhh," he whispered, hugging her tightly as she shook with sobs. "Shhhhh….Nellie….try to calm down. You'll wake Toby."

The instant the boy's name left his mouth, he regretted it….she paused for a few seconds, just long enough to lean back and look incredulously into his eyes….then burst into a flood of tears so violent he was afraid her corset would suffocate her. Her whole body trembled like a leaf, and he pulled her back into his arms, rocking her gently from side to side and _sshhhhhing _softly as he cursed himself for whatever it was he'd inadvertently said to upset her. Then, after a moment, he realized that she was muttered garbled words between her cries, her voice all but muted into his chest. He stopped rocking, looking down at her and trying to make out what it was she was saying.

"_My boy, my little Toby…." _she was crying over and over again, shaking her head against him. "_My boy, oh, my little darling….why did I do it? Why?? Why, Mr. Todd, why did I do it….."_

"There, Nellie….calm down, it's alright," he whispered, bracing her with his hands and easing her just far enough away that he could look her in the eye. She gasped and coughed, wiping her face with her hands and struggling to silence her cries. He gently pushed the tendrils of hair from her face and daubed at the mess beneath her eyes with the back of his knuckle.

"There," he said, when she'd finally calmed down enough to breath evenly in and out. Fresh tears continued to bud in the corners of her eyes, but she had at last gotten hold of herself. Now seriously worried, Sweeney kept one arm around her shoulders and the other in her lap as he tried to coax her into talking. For a long moment, she just sat there shaking her head and muttering to herself, her eyes glazed and staring off out the window.

"Why, Mr. Todd?" she kept asking over and over, her voice trembling and threatening to crack into tears again any moment. "Why did I do it? _'Ow could I?"_

"What?" he asked desperately, searching her face as if for clues. "How could you what, Nellie?"

Suddenly, she spun her head to look him in the eye, her face twisting with grief.

"'E was my _boy, _Sweeney!" she cried miserably, her voice hoarse and ragged. "'E was my own, my little Toby…my….my son. 'Ow….'ow could I let 'im….'ow could I let 'im _eat those? _'Ow could I let 'im eat those _'orrible things??"_

A cold chill jolted through Sweeney's stomach, and he felt himself go rigid. He blinked, his lips parting minutely as he stared into her pleading eyes. He tried to speak, but found himself abruptly without a voice.

"Oh….Nellie…." was all he could whisper.

She shook her head, tears rolling down her cheeks.

"I'm a monster, Mr. Todd, _I'm a sick, disgusting_…..'e was just a boy, just an innocent boy, an' I…..I _gave _'im those….those _wretched, evil things, _an' I….I _watched _'im eat them, an' I…..oh, God….oh, _God, _Sweeney, I'm a _monster, I'm an aberration! _My boy, my precious little boy…_"_

"Nellie," he whispered, scarcely able to take in the horror of what he was hearing, the searing agony in every word she cried, "Nellie, what….why all of this now?" He felt pathetic, but at that moment there was nothing else he could think of to say.

She continued to shake her head, her voice an endless stream of despairing moans.

"I…I jus' went in to say goodnight, to tuck 'im in, an'….an' 'e was already asleep, an' I went to give 'im a kiss, jus' one, jus' _one, _before I left, an'…..an'….oh, I don' know, Sweeney, I jus'….I looked at 'is face, and 'e was so quiet, an' so little, an' I….I don't know, it jus' came at me all at once….all the awful things I've done to 'im, all the vile, _'orrible _things I've done….I've done nothin' but lie to 'im since the moment 'e came to me, an' now….I'll never be able to tell 'im the truth about any of it! I'm a monster, an' 'e'll….'e'll never know, 'is 'ole life…._'is 'ole life is a lie! _It's a _lie, _Sweeney! 'Ow can I live with myself?? 'Ow can I live with what I've done to 'im?? 'E's my boy….oh, my love, my poor little thing….my poor little boy…."

Sweeney could do nothing but stare, helpless, as she degenerated once more into violent sobbing, hiding her face in her hands and shaking from head to toe. He felt as if his insides had disappeared….he felt as if the bottom of his stomach had opened into a void, a yawning chasm, and his heart had fallen straight into it. He wanted desperately to speak, but could find no words. The pain, the heartache, the ungodly burden of those awful, awful memories….the inescapable horror, the inescapable truth….the truth of what they'd done, the atrocities they'd committed together….he wished to God he could find a way to just lift it off of her, to take away all of her guilt and misery and carry it himself. He wished to God he could stop her hurting….and yet, he knew, no matter what he did….it would always be there.

She cried out again, as horribly as if someone were physically torturing her. Sweeney's teeth clenched, his fingernails digging into his own palm. _He couldn't listen to this. He had to make it stop._

"Nellie," he said lowly, darkly, his jaw firm and his grip tightening on her shoulders. She continued to sob. He took her with both hands, shaking her once, ever so lightly. "_Nellie!"_

After a long, gasping moment, she finally turned to look at him, her eyes streaming and her face an absolute mess. The very sight of her made his heart ache….he had never seen her in such pain…but he grit his teeth, forcing himself not to break down, not to give in to the cold fingers of guilt that were starting to creep around his own mind. _She thought __**she **__was a monster? She thought __**she **__had done horrible things? _

_No….he couldn't let himself be overcome by his own sins. Not right now._

"Nellie," he said a final time, forcing her to look at him. His voice trembling, his gaze burning into hers, he spoke, holding her close to him, staring her straight in the eye.

"Listen to me, Nellie. You said….that Toby's life is a lie. That…that because he doesn't know the whole truth, about….about _us_….that his whole life is a lie."

Her mouth twisted with the desire to sob aloud, but she held it back. Tears ran from her eyes in rivers….but through it, she managed to nod. Sweeney swallowed thickly, willing himself to be strong.

"Then tell me this, Nellie. Is it a lie that you love him?"

There was a long, still silence.

Nellie looked as if she wanted to curl into a ball and never come out again. She squeezed her eyes shut, the tears flowing out even through her closed lids. She hung her head down, covering her face with her hands. Her shoulders shook, racked with silent cries. Sweeney bit back the enormous lump welling in the back of his throat and forced himself to keep his composure, taking her chin lightly in his hand and bringing her back up to look at him.

"Answer me, Nellie. Is it a lie…that you love him?"

Crying softly, the makeup now almost washed from her face by the endless fountain of tears….she shook her head.

"No," she finally whispered, her voice almost completely crumbled. _"No."_

"_No," _he repeated, an ounce of his strength returning, even though his words were beginning to tremble. _"__**No. **_It's not a lie. It's not a lie, because you love him more than anything, Nellie. You love him every bit as much as any mother could love her son."

Nellie closed her eyes, racked with silent agony. He held her close to him and kept going, lifting one hand to hold the back of her head.

"No, Nellie, Toby's life isn't a lie. He knows the truth…._he knows that you're his mother, and you love him. _We can never escape the horrible things we did, Nellie. Nothing we do can ever get rid of the things we did. But Nellie….listen to me…._it isn't his burden to bear."_

She leaned forward, falling into him, hiding her face in his neck. He felt the lump getting bigger, choking him, urging him toward tears of his own, but he swallowed and kept his eyes dry. He put his arms around her back and held her flush up against him.

"_It isn't Toby's burden to bear," _he said again, trying to give her strength while at the same time drawing his own from her touch. "And it's not only yours, either. Do you remember what you told me our first night in this room? The two of us are guilty. We will always be guilty. _But we'll be guilty together, Nellie."_

Her arms had found their way around the small of his back, and he drank in the feeling of her wrapped around his torso. He let his cheek rest in the soft crown of her hair and realized that his eyes were beginning to sting with unshed tears.

"Toby deserves this. He deserves a home, and a family, and a _life. _It isn't his responsibility to live with the things that happened. _He knows that you love him. _That's all he needs to know, Nellie."

Very suddenly overcome with emotion, Sweeney heard himself do something he had not done in longer than he could remember.

He sniffled.

Quickly dashing at his eyes with the back of his hand, he sniffed again, holding Nellie closer and burying his fingers deep into her hair. He rocked her gently, and realized that she had finally stopped trembling.

"_That's all he needs to know."_

Almost two hours later, once he was absolutely positive that Nellie was sound asleep against his chest, Sweeney slowly, carefully, slipped out from under her, lowering her down to rest her head on the thick heap of pillows at the head of their bed. She grumbled quietly in her sleep, but quickly resettled on the pillows, her face blank, still smudged here and there with her black tears, the sound of delicate snoring buzzing faintly as she breathed in and out.

Walking practically on his toes, Sweeney slowly crept out of the bedroom, wincing every time his stocking feet made the floorboards creak. Closing the door behind him, but stopping it just a hair's width from clicking the lock, he moved the few short steps down the hallway until he stood outside the closed door of Toby's room. Taking a deep, steadying breath, Sweeney carefully pushed it open and moved quietly inside.

The small bedside lamp sitting on the nightstand had been left on, and the flame was burning low behind the glass, casting a dim, deep golden half-light through the room and throwing everything into a dark shadow. Toby lay there, fast asleep beneath the covers of his bed, Pie curled up in a ball down at his feet. The puppy, in all honestly, wasn't much of a puppy anymore….he had grown to more than twice the size he'd been when they bought him those few short months ago. _God….had it really only been a few months? It felt like years had passed since that day they set out from the mouth of the Thames, sailing away from England forever, without so much as glancing back. _As he stood there beside Toby's bed, looking down at the sleeping, shadowed little face of his son, Sweeney realized for the first time since arriving in America just how old he really felt.

_Old, and tired….but at the same time, peaceful. Peaceful, and….._

…._happy._

_He hadn't actually stopped to let himself think about it….he had been so caught up with the surreal effort of making a new home and a new life in this place, so caught up with the unbelievable idea that he was actually alive, that he had a family again….that he had a child, and a __**wife**__…..that Nellie, Eleanor Lovett, was actually his __**wife**__….but now, when he truly stopped, and let himself take everything in…..he knew it was the truth._

_He….Sweeney Todd……was happy._

For a long, long time, Sweeney stood silently beside the bed, watching Toby as he slept. Every once in a while, Pie would lift his orange scruffy head and yawn, stand up and turn in circles and resettle between the boy's feet…..twice, Toby scrunched his face and tossed to his other side….but Sweeney never moved a muscle. He just stood in the shadows….watching.

Finally, long after he had lost track of the minutes….Sweeney took two steps forward and bent down, bracing himself gently on the edge of the bed and making not a single sound in the semi- darkness. Moving softly and quietly, he leaned forward and touched his mouth to Toby's forehead so lightly, the boy didn't even stir.

_He knows that he is loved._

_And that's all he ever needs to know._

"Goodnight….son," Sweeney mouthed silently.

He turned to leave, but just as he reached the doorway, his foot fell on a warped board and emitted a loud, groaning _crrreeeeaaaak. _Sweeney cringed, hurriedly ducking through the doorway pushing it closed behind him, careful again not to click the lock. He stood frozen in the hallway for a few seconds, holding his breath….he thought for a moment that he heard movement from inside the room, but it soon quieted again into total stillness.

Exhaling slowly----_and wondering, not for the first time, what on earth he could have possibly done to have earned a second chance at life_----he went back down the hall and slipped silently into he and Nellie's bedroom, crawling into bed beside his wife without even bothering to take of his vest. Nellie was still snoring. In spite of himself, Sweeney smiled.

_Nothing. There's nothing I could have done to deserve this….to deserve you. But then….maybe that's what salvation is all about._

He tucked a single strand of hair behind her ear before letting his head sink into the pillow and drift off into a dark, wandering sleep.

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

It was just before the first rays of the breaking dawn that Nellie was awakened by a small nudge on her shoulder.

Snorting in a very un-ladylike fashion, she jerked abruptly awake, raising herself up on her arms and blinking groggily in the darkness. Squinting as hard as she could, she could just make out the white pajamas and scrawny outline of Toby, kneeling on the floor just beside the bed.

Her mind slow and dogged with sleep, it was a moment before she remembered.

"Toby," she mumbled in surprise, smearing one hand over her face and wondering briefly why she'd gone to bed still fully dressed. She yawned widely, wrinkling her face at the stale taste of her mouth. "What….what's the matter, darlin'?"

In the blue darkness of pre-dawn, she couldn't make out the expression on the boy's little face…but when he spoke, the uneasiness in his voice instantly made her ears prick up, and she sat up straighter and more alert in the bed.

"Well….its….nothing's really wrong, mum, I just, sorta….I sort of 'ad a….a…."

Then, all at once, she remembered.

The blinding, terrible pain of the few hours previous came rushing back to her all at once, and she immediately choked on a lump in her throat. For an instant she was terrified that the sound of his voice was going to set her gushing with tears all over again…but she quickly reached beside her and felt the strong, sturdy form of Sweeney lying next to her, the soft sounds of his breathing ebbing beneath her like the tide….and, swallowing thickly and remembering words….she kept herself together.

"Oh, love," she whispered, her voice catching just faintly. She coughed to clear it and reached forward half blindly until she found Toby's face, cupping it gently with her hand. "Toby, sweet 'eart, did you….'ave a nightmare?"

He shrugged, turning his face away in embarrassment.

"It weren't _really _a nightmare, it was….it was jus' sort of a funny dream, an' I….jus' sort of can't get to sleep again."

"There, love, it's nothin' to be ashamed of," Nellie crooned soothingly. "We all get scared of our dreams now an' then."

"I'm not scared!" Toby piped up defensively. Nellie quickly put her finger to his lips and shushed him.

"Shhhh, dearie, you'll wake Mr. Todd!"

"Sorry," he muttered quickly, lowering his voice to a near whisper. "But it _ain't_ that I'm scared, or anythin,' I jus' can't get back to sleep is all."

Nellie nodded understandingly. "Mm-hmmm. And?"

"And…I….I was sorta wondrin', if….maybe…."

"Maybe….?"

"Maybe, I could….sleep….in 'ere, with you? Jus' for a little while, I mean?"

Nellie smiled….a wide, sad smile. Deep inside, her heart was bleeding at the very sight of Toby's shadowy face…the very sound of his little voice, the feel of his scruffy hair. She didn't know why it was that the sight of him lying in his bed those few short hours had brought on this sudden attack of all the horrible memories of what she'd done to him, the unbearable guilt of all the lies she'd told to him….but whatever the reason….deep down, she also knew that Sweeney was right.

_It's not a lie that you love him._

_And that's all he needs to know._

And so….she smiled through the pain.

"O' course you can, darlin'. Climb on in."

Even in the dark, she could make out the bright flash of Toby's grin as he wasted no time scrambling over her legs and burrowing underneath the covers, nestled closely in between she and Mr. Todd. Sweeney stirred lightly in his sleep from the jostling of the mattress, turning to roll onto his back and throw one arm over his head, but he didn't wake up. He snorted once in his sleep, his eyes shut peacefully and lips parted just so. Nellie and Toby held perfectly still until they were sure he was sound asleep, then looked at each other and stifled their snickers. Pulling the covers up over their heads, they snuggled down together into the mountain of pillows, Toby curled up beside her with his face resting in the crook of her neck. Within minutes he was still and silent, his breathing shallow and even.

_My little Toby…my boy…._

She couldn't keep a single tear from rolling down her cheek as she kissed the crown of his head, hugging him closer to her and burying her head down in the darkness.

"I love you, Toby," she whispered.

She nearly jumped out of her skin when she heard his small voice, as clear as day, answer quietly and calmly in his dazed, half-sleeping drone,

"I know you do, mum."

Nellie lay there, her eyes wide open, with Toby pressed to her heart, until the sun came shining through the window.

-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-0-

_It will never be like you dreamed._

_It will never be like I remember._

_It will never be perfect._

_But it's ours. _

It was a Sunday morning….the first Sunday of June. It was a beautiful day….warm, and breezy, with enormous clouds drifting across the sky like whales in an ocean of cobalt, passing slowly across the sun and casting great, lazy shadows over the warm sands.

They'd been back from church less than half an hour, but already Sweeney had lost track of both Toby and Nellie. He'd gone upstairs to change out of his good navy suit into a set of comfortable day clothes and shirt sleeves, and when he came down again the house was quiet and empty. The curtains were open and the bright yellow sun of mid-morning was streaming inside, lighting the wide rooms into every nook and cranny, but neither of them were to be seen.

Curious, Sweeney wandered over to the back windows in the kitchen/tea shop, looking out over the vast, sprawling beach as he absently adjusted his cuffs. The shoreline was marked up and down the beach in both directions was dozens of people, families and children from the nearby houses, all out enjoying the gorgeous weather. Most of them were dressed and merely rollicking about in the sand, but a few adventurous ones were in their swimming clothes, looking as if they were considering braving the still chilly salt waters. Sweeney narrowed his eyes in the direction of the horizon….as bright as beautiful as it was now, there was a far distant bank of grey, watery-looking clouds rolling toward them from out as sea. If he was any judge, they'd be seeing a decent spot of rain within the next few hours.

It was then that he happened to glance down and notice the single envelope sitting on one of the tea tables.

But before Sweeney could even reach for it, the abrupt, ringing _bang _of the front door slamming made him jump. He turned around to see Toby tearing through the foyer and into the parlor practically at a dead sprint, Pie chasing after his heels and making an incessant racket with his constant barking.

"Hi Dad!" Toby threw carelessly over his shoulder as he ran from room to room, crouching down on his knees to look under furniture and in corners, then jumping up again to hurry somewhere else.

Sweeney blinked, his hand hovering over the momentarily forgotten envelope. For a curious moment, he watched as the boy scurried to and fro all around the kitchen and the parlor, searching arduously in every nook and cranny he could think of. Sweeney tilted one eyebrow.

"What are you doing?" he asked blankly.

Toby answered in a broken, breathless voice as he continued to ransack the living room. "Lookin' for my play shoes….I need to 'urry, Sophie's waitin' for me on the beach. The wind is up and she's brought 'er new kite….blasted 'ell, _where are those---"_

Sweeney coughed loudly, waiting until Toby looked up at him to point down at the scruffy little pair of shoes sitting by the back door….along with several other pairs of shoes, all in the exact place Nellie always kept them. Toby straightened up, grinning in triumph and running over to snatch the shoes and hastily stuff his feet into them.

"Toby," Sweeney mumbled absently, looking down again and remembering the envelope.

"Huh?"

"Do you know what this is? There's no post on Sundays."

"What what is? Oh, that….yeah, while you was upstairs, Fitz Northing stopped by on a walk and dropped it off, said it was for you. Pie? Where'd 'e go? Oh….there, come on boy! Come on!"

Sweeney was just able to catch the back of Toby's head with his hand to scruff his hair as he ran out the door, down the veranda and onto the beach, where a pretty little girl of about ten or eleven was already waiting for him.

"Mind the other people!" Sweeney leaned out the door and shouted after them as they hurried down the shore, nearly running over a lady with a parasol. They kept running, obviously not hearing him. Sweeney hooked one corner of his mouth, shaking his head….it was less than a week ago that Toby had met Sophia Bookerling, the big-eyed, brown-haired little daughter of their neighbors three doors down, but already the two of them had become all but inseparable.

As he watched the two children running off together through the sand, Sweeney noticed one of the beach-goers' blankets was set up straight out from the end of their veranda….he squinted more closely at it and saw that it was none other than Nellie. Her auburn hair glowed an ever more brilliant shade of coppery red in the sunshine, and she was still wearing her church dress….a pale blue and creamy white configuration of silk and polka dots, all billowing skirts and crimped sleeves. Though he might never admit it aloud….least of all to her….there was something about Nellie's gaudy, incorrigibly tacky taste in fashion that Sweeney had come to find….well….charming. _Not that he'd be complaining if she were to throw out…..say….the flamingo pink lace-covered number she'd brought home from town a few days ago, but….still…..charming, nonetheless._

Just as he was about to step outside and make his way toward Nellie, he remembered the paper still closed in his hand. It was a thick, heavy envelope, and looking over it he noticed that the end had already been slit open. His interest quickly rekindled, Sweeney turned the letter over in his fingers a few times before opening it, squinting down and silently mouthing the words written in tiny, impeccably neat handwriting on the cover. His eyes widened and his heart leapt into his mouth as he read the name in the return address.

It was a letter from Daniel!

_But it was addressed to Fitzwilliam Northing….why had he brought it here?_

Without pausing to ponder it any further, Sweeney anxiously pulled out the contents of the envelope. There were indeed several pages folded up inside….three, to be exact. They appeared to be three separate letters, each with their own signature. Bewildered, but curious, Sweeney smoothed the creases on the first sheet of paper and eagerly began to read.

_Dear Mr. Todd,_

_If he has not already explained it to you, you are doubtless wondering why this letter was enclosed in an envelope addressed to my cousin Fitz. We were all eager to write to you, but I thought it would be the wisest decision for all of us if I were to relay all communication through Fitzwilliam and have him pass it on to you; it is most likely an unnecessary precaution, but just in case anyone from the yard __**were**__ to come across it, it would be a fair slight safer for there __**not **__to be a letter addressed, from me, to a Mr. Sweeney Todd….particularly since he is supposed to be dead, at the moment._

Sweeney paused for a moment to close his eyes and snort with spontaneous laughter before reading on.

_All explanations aside, however…..Mr. Todd! How are you? I very much hope this letter finds both you and your family safe and well. Fitz wrote to me several weeks ago saying that he believed everything was going smoothly with the new house; I do hope you're enjoying it in Virginia. I've never been to America myself, but my cousin tells me it has some lovely countryside, especially along the coast. How is Mrs. Lovett? Although I suppose I ought to call her Mrs. Todd, now, oughtn't I? Please, give her my warmest regards, and tell her that despite the terrible circumstances of how we met, I am still eternally grateful for everything that happened between us. I cannot tell you what meeting the two of you did for me, Mr. Todd; I could not express it adequately in words at the time of our farewell, and I am afraid I cannot do it on paper, either. I only hope that you have some inkling of it yourself._

_I am afraid I have very little skill at writing social letters; for the time being, I can think of nothing else to say, except that I hope the three of you are doing very well. Enclosed with this envelope are two other letters, one from Anthony and one from Johanna. I have been keeping very close acquaintance with the Hopes, and they are each as excited to hear from you as I am. Please, we should love to have word of all that you've been doing; simply send your letters through Fitz, he'll know what to do with them. Anthony and Johanna send their love,_

_Your friend and servant,_

_Sgt. Daniel Artemis Northing._

Sweeney read the last line of the letter, then blinked and read it again. _Nothing to say, my eye! Sgt. _Daniel Northing? He'd been promoted, and he hadn't even thought to mention it in his letter? Sweeney shook his head, chuckling half with amazement. _Same old modest Daniel…._

Then, Sweeney stopped. He froze for a split second, his eyes fixed on the lines of tidy scrawl.

_Letters from Anthony and Johanna!!_

_A letter from Johanna! _

_A letter from his daughter!_

His heart suddenly racing into overdrive, his mind almost delirious with excitement, Sweeney took a deep breath and forced himself to calm down. His hands trembled on the two remaining pages from the envelope; as anxious as he was to read Johanna's letter, he kept them in the order they'd been laid and forced himself to read through Anthony's first. It was even shorter than Daniel's had been, but he could hear every word of it as clear and honestly as if Anthony was standing in the very room with him.

_My dear friend Sweeney,_

_Oh, how I hope these letters find you well! So much has happened since that day at the Thames, and I swear that Johanna, Daniel and I have not gone a single day without thinking of you. We pray that you are safe and that you have been able to make a home for yourselves in Virginia. How I wish there were a way we could speak to you in person…I have so much I want to ask! I will have to content myself with this brief letter until the day we may finally see each other again._

_Johanna and I have just this week made the final payment on our cottage in the downs….it's ours, Sweeney, it truly belongs to us! I cannot tell you the happiness it gives me to finally own our own home….I wish you could see it, my friend. Johanna is so proud, she keeps the entire place spotless. Perhaps, someday, you may be able to come back to England to visit us._

_My friend….there is so much I want to discuss with you, so many things to thank you for, but as I sit now to write this letter, the words fail me. All I can say now is that I hope you are happy, Sweeney. I hope you are as happy as I am. I hope that you and Toby and Mrs. Lovett will always be as happy as I am this very minute._

_Thank you, Mr. Todd. Thank you….for everything._

_Until we meet again, I am ever your friend----_

_Anthony._

Without pausing, without breathing, Sweeney flung the other pages onto the table and peered down at the third and final letter…._Johanna's letter._

His heart was thundering in his ears. His palms were sweating. He could hear nothing, see nothing outside of the single square of white paper, marked with delicate lines of feminine script written in dark red ink. Somewhat to his dismay, Johanna's letter was even shorter still than either Daniel or Toby's….but he immediately realized it didn't matter one but. As he attacked the lines of writing, Sweeney felt as if he could scarcely breathe. It opened with a single word….just one word, blazing on the paper before his eyes.

_Father---_

He stared at that single word for what felt like a long, long time.

We he was finally able to continue reading, Sweeney realized that there was a lump catching in his throat.

_Father---_

_Anthony has not read this letter. I told him that I was writing it to Mrs. Lovett, and that I wanted it to be private, just between us women. Please, tell Mrs. Lovett that I love her, and I am thinking of her…but I'm afraid this letter isn't for her. I couldn't write to you as if you were only 'Mr. Todd,' father, I simply couldn't. That's why I couldn't let Anthony read this. Father. I have something to tell you. I haven't told it to anyone else….but by the time you read this, I'm certain Anthony will know._

_Father….I'm pregnant._

Sweeney froze.

He stared down at the words on the page….he stared at them so hard they soon ceased to bear any meaning, and were nothing but curving red shapes of nonsense.

Slowly….slowly….Sweeney groped behind him until he found a chair, then slowly, slowly, sank down into it.

He laid the letter flat on the table and looked up, his eyes gazing far away into space. It was five minutes before he could look down again.

_Johanna….his Johanna…..his daughter….._

…_.was pregnant._

The next line of the letter spelled out, word for word, the exact thought that was going through Sweeney's mind at that exact instant.

_You're going to be a grandpa._

_I haven't told Anthony yet. I wanted you to be the first person I told….I only wish you were here, so I could have told it to you face to face. To be honest, I don't know how I feel about it at this very moment. You don't know how badly I wish you were here, father….oh, you could never know how badly. I'm frightened….and yet, at the same time, I don't think I've ever felt braver. I'm sad now and then, and yet I know that I've never been happier. I suppose it will take some time for me to fully understand that it really is happening._

_I'm not sure why I think so, father, but I believe our baby is going to be a girl. I was wondering what you thought about naming her Lucy._

_I wanted you to be the first person I told._

_I love you, father._

_We are coming to America to see you as soon as the baby is born. I'm going to make sure of it._

_I miss you._

_With all the love in my heart, your daughter----_

_Johanna._

Sweeney laid the letter down flat on the table. He looked up.

He sat there, without moving, for a long time.

When he finally stood up, he felt as if the floor had vanished from under his feet and he was walking on air. He felt as if he were going to wake up any minute. He felt as if he desperately needed to cry, and yet his deadpan expression didn't even crack; his eyes stared forward, dry and wandering, lost in disbelief.

_I was wondering what you thought about naming her Lucy._

He went and stood out on the veranda. He felt as if he had never seen the sun before. He looked out on the beach and spotted the periwinkle blue blanket that Nellie was still sitting on.

He decided that he was going to wait until that night to tell her. He was going to wait until he had the words.

As he made his way across the beach toward the spot where she sat, kneeling primly on the wide blanket with her hat and cane resting beside her, Sweeney noticed she was reading from a book held a few inches in front of her face. He could scarcely contain the euphoria that was threatening to burst out of his at any moment from Johanna's letter; yet, as he came nearer to her, he felt himself calming, the surging rush of emotion quelling into a gentle lull….a lull that could wait just a little while longer. His is mouth quirking a half smile, Sweeney came straight up behind her, bending over and prodding her gently on the shoulder.

"Good reading weather?"

Nellie yelped in surprise and fumbled the book, dropping it in a flourish of pages and whirling around, her hand on her heart. As soon as she saw who it was she swung a half-hearted punch toward his legs. Sweeney chuckled softly and stepped back out of her reach. Nellie growled in frustration, spinning back to retrieve her crumpled book as he sat down next to her on the blanket.

"If I've told you once, I've told you a _dozen _times…._don't bloody sneak up on me like that!! _I swear, Mr. T, you won't be 'appy 'til you've shattered my poor nerves all to pieces."

"What are you reading?" he asked curiously, ignoring her muttered complaints. She stubbornly turned her back to him, sniffing indignantly and thumbing back to her place. Sweeney rolled his eyes, but smiled, craning his neck to try and see around her. She only turned further, deliberately ignoring him. He shook his head, smiling.

Sweeney felt strange. He couldn't put a word to the light-headed, floating sensation steadily rising from the bottom of his stomach….he knew it was a kind of happiness, but…..he had never felt anything like it before.

_You're going to be a grandpa._

No…he couldn't put a word to it. And he didn't care. He leaned close to Nellie, creeping his fingertips playfully up the back of her neck.

"Do you know how much I love you?" he breathed, in a whisper so low it was almost inaudible.

"What?" she replied. "I can't 'ear you."

"I said I was sorry. Can I see what you're reading?"

She turned a single, glaring eye toward him, but he could see she was softening. He knew she wouldn't be able to resist the opportunity to prattle about something.

"Well….alright, but on'y because it's Sunday."

Turning to face him, she held out the book for him to look at him. It was a small, thick little leather-bound volume with the title picked out in flashing gold lettering. It read _Parlor Poetry._

Sweeney raised one eyebrow, but said nothing. _Better than "Rules of Etiquette," at least, which he'd caught her rereading in the kitchen just last week…._

"And how is it?" he asked quietly, no longer looking at the book, but at the flushed profile of her face, with loose spirals of hair wafting lightly in the breeze around her ears_. _She answered, but for a moment her words didn't even register in his mind….he was distracted by a speck that had gotten stuck in her thick, dark lashes, which she'd blinked away before realizing it was there. He fought the urge to trace the tip of his finger just along the tips of those lashes. _God….she looks beautiful today….._

Realizing he'd fazed out for a moment, Sweeney shook himself and looked back down at _Parlor Poetry, _but discovered she'd lifted it off of her lap and was holding it in front of her nose again. That, unfortunately, got him looking at the discrete groove of her skirt dimpling in between her thighs….

"Sweeney?" she chirped abruptly, and he realized she'd been talking the whole time. "Are you listenin' to me?"

"Of course," he parroted automatically, regretting it the moment he said it.

Nellie sighed, shaking her head. "Why do I bother? Now I'm really _not _going to read it to you."

Honestly curious, now, Sweeney inched closer to her on the blanket, nudging her shoulder.

"Please, Nellie? I promise, I'm really listening."

She cast him a disbelieving look out of the corner of her eyes, but he could sense she truly was warming to him again. He nudged her once more for good measure, and glowed with triumph when he finally elicited a smile from her painted mouth.

"Well….if you'd _really_ been _listenin', _you'd know I found a poem 'ere that I think….well….I think you might rather like it, love."

He let his hand slide innocently to rest on her thigh. "You did," he said calmly, leaning to peer over her shoulder and not-so-secretly steal a glance at her amply-corseted cleavage.

Easily spotting what he was doing, Nellie feigned a mortified slap at his chest, but the attempt at sourness was ruined by her warmly flushing cheeks and clearly visible smile.

"_Stop _it, you! We are in _public, _you know."

"Read it to me," he said, smiling over her shoulder. "What's it called?"

She cast him a final wary glance, but lifted the book to her face again.

"The author is signed on'y as _Anonymous, _but the title is _'Our Life, You and I.'"_

Sweeney nodded absently, letting his chin fall forward to rest on her bare shoulder. Nellie giggled and swatted at him again, but he pushed her hand away and slipped his arm around her waist.

"_Mr. Todd! _There are children out!"

"Then you'd better read it quickly,before they see."

Clucking her tongue and failing to hide her pleasure at their close proximity, Nellie put her finger to the page and began reading aloud, her voice soft and throaty beside his ear.

"_Ahem….._an' you'd better listen, this time, 'cause I'm on'y reading it once…'ere it goes…._Our Life, You and I;_

'_As a rose with its thorns….as a mourner, 'is sigh_

_As all beauty must fade, as all living, must die_

_As the young must grow old, as the vibrant grow weak_

_As the valleys must fall, so the mountains may peak;_

_So is our love….yours and mine._

_Blood must run dry, at the end of its day_

_Without sweet blissful death, so that bones may decay_

_There is no womb through which a new life finds its way_

_And no steps leading on to that dizzying sway;_

_Without sorrow, we cannot have joy._

_For that is our fortune, our reason, and why_

_When the darkness falls in, and the winter birds cry_

_We rejoice in the clouds as they blot out the sky_

_For only in trial, we find strength to try._

_So is our love…..yours, and mine._

_It will never be simple; our strife, ever nigh_

_It will never be cloudless, an unblemished sky_

_But it's yours, and its mine; and I rather would die_

_Than 'ave any other for me to live by._

_They're yours, and they're mine_

_These tears that we cry_

_It will be ours together;_

_Our life…..you and I.'"_

Nearby, the waves rolled peacefully onto the shore. Nearby, Toby was chasing a kite through the sands with his little friend Sophie. And far away, on the other side of the world, Johanna Hope was with child in a little cottage in the Downs.

The rain clouds were still forming on the horizon. _It will never be cloudless._

Nellie's pale, delicate fingers lingered over the letters on the page. He shifted his chin over her shoulder, his arms tightening around her waist, his eyes narrowed at the words….thinking.

_Our life….you and I._

After a short moment of contemplation and gentle stillness, Nellie spoke.

"Do you like it, love?"

He thought for a moment more.

He pressed a single kiss to her neck, and she leaned into his embrace. The gulls crowed. The waves pounded. They sat there together, by the sea….she, and him….a barber, and his wife.

Sweeney Todd smiled.

"Yes. I like it."

_Not like you dreamed. Not like I remember. But I like it, Nellie. _

_Because it's yours, and its mine._

_It's our life….you and I. _

_**THE END.**_


End file.
